Therapeutic Goods Administration approves Moderna Covid vaccine

The Moderna Covid-19 vaccine has been approved for use in Australia, with the first one million jabs due to arrive within weeks.

The Moderna Covid-19 vaccine has been approved for use in Australia with the first million doses of the jab to be available in pharmacies within weeks.

But with a major boost to vaccine supply not due until later this year, Prime Minister Scott Morrison has acknowledged Australians were “frustrated” with the pandemic.

“I know they’re sick of it,” he said. “I know they’re angry.

“I know they want it to stop and for life to get back to where they knew it.”

But Mr Morrison said he understood people were looking to him as prime minister wanting solutions to the constant lockdowns.

“None of us likes to have restrictions,” he said.

“We don’t want it to be this way. I don’t want it to be like this for you and your family.”

The Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) on Monday approved the Moderna jab, which is an mRNA type vaccine like the Pfizer option, which triggers the first shipment to Australia.

From there the doses will be batch tested, and initially rolled out through local pharmacies.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison announcing that the Moderna vaccine has been approved in Australia. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Gary Ramage

Prime Minister Scott Morrison (R) with Health Minister Greg Hunt and Professor John Skerritt. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Gary Ramage

Australia has ordered 10m Moderna doses for this year, and a further 15m of a potential updated version to be used as “booster” shots in the future.

Unlike Pfizer, the Moderna vaccine can be stored at normal freezer temperature, and the company is also in the early stages of looking to trial it in children aged six months to 12-years-old.

TGA head John Skerritt said the Moderna vaccine was currently only approved in Australia for use in adults.

“It is proving to be 93 per cent efficacious against any infection, 98 per cent against severe disease and 100 per cent against death, and that’s really exciting,” he said.

“The data on the teenagers does look good and we should be able to make a decision … within the next three or four weeks on an application for use in 12 and over.”

As Australia’s vaccine rollout finally starts to speed up with more than 1.3m doses administered in the last week, Mr Morrison said Moderna was another “important tool” in the country’s “battle” against Covid-19.

Mr Morrison said the delta variant had “changed the rules” of the pandemic and urged people to follow stay-at-home orders.

“All the tools that we had, test, trace, isolate, quarantine, all this proved very effective against earlier strains and did enable jurisdictions to be able to continue to keep much of their states entirely open on occasions. Delta has changed all of that.”

Mr Morrison said there were “no short cuts” to get out of lockdown.

“Please stay at home,” he said.

“Don’t go out for hours on end.

“Don’t congregate in areas of Sydney. Don’t do it. Stay at home. Only go out if you absolutely have to.”