EMA: Shot for Omicron could be approved in months

Speaking to the European Parliament, European Medicines Agency (EMA) executive director Emer Cooke said it was not known if drugmakers would need to tweak their vaccines to protect against Omicron, but the agency was preparing for that possibility.

Her comments came as drugmaker Moderna's CEO set off fresh alarm bells in financial markets on Tuesday (November 30) after he warned that vaccines were unlikely to be as effective against the variant first detected in southern Africa as they have been against the Delta variant.