By Dhirendra Tripathi
Investing.com – Novavax stock (NASDAQ:NVAX) climbed more than 6% Tuesday as Takeda Pharmaceutical (NYSE:TAK) said the Japanese government will purchase 150 million doses of the Covid-19 vaccine it will produce using the American company’s formula.
Japan's biggest drugmaker will make 250 million doses of the vaccine domestically and distribute it in early 2022, pending approval from regulators, according to a company statement today and previous announcements.
Novavax is licensing and transferring manufacturing technologies to enable Takeda to manufacture the vaccine, according to the statement.
Takeda is also distributing imported Moderna (NASDAQ:MRNA) vaccines in Japan. It plans to import 50 million doses of those shots.
Almost two weeks ago, the discovery of fragments of stainless steel some batches led to the suspension of as many as 2.6 million doses of Moderna’s 'messenger RNA'-based vaccine in Japan. So far, three people have died in Japan after taking Moderna doses though the actual cause of the deaths is yet to be ascertained. The vaccines were found to be from the suspended batches.
The world’s third largest economy is battling its worst wave of the pandemic.
After a slow start, 58% of the population has now received at least one dose, according to a Reuters tracker.