COVID-19: Iraq records 2,390 infections, 42 deaths as US company announces new vaccine

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – The Iraqi Ministry of Health and Environment on Monday announced 2,390 new COVID-19 infections and 42 deaths in the country.

The health ministry mentioned that it had conducted 17,887 tests over 24 hours, making a total of 3,146,289 tests carried out since the beginning of the outbreak in Iraq.

According to the latest health figures, the total infections in Iraq have now reached 521,542, with 449,565 recoveries and 11,712 deaths.

The Kurdistan Region reports its daily COVID-19 statistics separately.

Read More: COVID-19: Kurdistan Region total infections surpass 90,000 cases; UAE aid group donates ambulances

Vaccine updates

On Monday, US-based company Moderna announced that its vaccine against the coronavirus had produced a 94.5 percent success rate, describing the achievement as “a great day.”

Moderna’s announcement follows fellow American company Pfizer’s who had earlier revealed a vaccine with a 90 percent success rate.

Moderna said it plans to apply for approval from Washington and hopes to begin distributing the vaccine soon. The company noted in its statement that it intends to apply for an “emergency use” license within the next few weeks.

According to Moderna, the preliminary results were based on 95 cases from people of Hispanic, Caucasian, African, and Asian origin, adding that no safety concerns were reported.

The trial involved 30,000 Americans. Half of them were given two doses of the vaccine, four weeks apart. The other half had dummy injections in the final phase of its vaccine trials.

The American company previously published the complete protocol for its experiments at various stages, in response to calls for more transparency.

Editing by Karzan Sulaivany