Fresh data show toll South African virus variant takes on vaccine efficacy

By Julie Steenhuysen CHICAGO (Reuters) - Clinical trial data on two COVID-19 vaccines show that a coronavirus variant first identified in South Africa is lessening their ability to protect against the illness, underscoring the need to vaccinate vast numbers of people as quickly as possible, scientists said. The vaccines from Novavax Inc and Johnson & Johnson were welcomed as important future weapons in curbing deaths and hospitalizations in a pandemic that has infected more than 101 million people and claimed over 2 million lives worldwide. But they were significantly less effective at prevent...