Moderna
US mRNA vaccine and medicines company, maker of the Spikevax COVID-19 vaccine.
Moderna's Bundibugyo Ebola vaccine, mRNA-1469, has been in human testing since a volunteer in Truro, Nova Scotia was dosed on 3 August 2026, and CEPI money also carries its Phase 3 H5N1 vaccine trial.
Last refreshed: 4 October 2026 · Appears in 1 active topic
Can Moderna's mRNA platform deliver the first Bundibugyo vaccine before the DRC outbreak peaks?
Timeline for Moderna
Mentioned in: CEPI awards Minapharm US$16.5m for Ebola
Pandemics and BiosecurityDosed the first human participant with mRNA-1469
Pandemics and Biosecurity: Moderna doses first human in TruroMentioned in: CEPI funds a fourth Ebola vaccine
Pandemics and BiosecurityReceived $50m CEPI commitment for Bundibugyo mRNA candidate through Phase 1
Pandemics and Biosecurity: CEPI and GAVI commit $112m, no treatment yetCEPI rescues Moderna H5N1 vaccine trial
Pandemics and BiosecurityBackground
Moderna's outbreak vaccines now share the company's attention with a cancer programme. On 19 August 2026 Moderna and Merck reported that intismeran autogene, an individualised mRNA melanoma therapy, met its primary endpoint in the 1,137-patient Phase 3 INTerpath-001 trial. The trial lead called it the first Phase 3 study to beat Keytruda alone in that setting.
The company was founded in 2010 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and builds vaccines and medicines on messenger RNA. Stéphane Bancel, formerly head of the French diagnostics firm bioMérieux, has been chief executive since 2011. Its COVID-19 vaccine, Spikevax, was authorised in late 2020 and made Moderna one of two companies to prove mRNA at population scale.
The platform's selling point in an outbreak is speed: an antigen can be updated in weeks rather than the months conventional vaccines need. That is why funders turned to it for both H5N1, where its Phase 3 trial began on 21 April 2026, and Bundibugyo ebolavirus, for which no licensed vaccine or treatment exists.
Outside money carries Moderna's outbreak vaccines
Moderna's pandemic programmes in 2026 run on CEPI funding. Dosing in the Phase 3 trial of its H5N1 vaccine, mRNA-1018, began on 21 April, the furthest any mRNA H5N1 candidate has gone. When the US Department of Health and Human Services withdrew federal funding, CEPI committed $54.3m in May to keep the trial running.
The same funder backs its Ebola work. CEPI committed up to $50m on 1 June for mRNA-1469, a Bundibugyo candidate, and the first volunteer received it on 3 August in a Phase 1 trial of about 80 adults. That trial measures safety and immune response; protection must be shown later in the field. Oxford's ChAdOx1 vaccine reached people first, on 24 July, while Egypt's Minapharm, funded with up to $16.5m on 27 August, starts behind Moderna.
Outside money carries Moderna's outbreak vaccines
Is Moderna developing an Ebola vaccine?
Why did the US government stop funding Moderna's H5N1 trial?
What is Moderna's H5N1 vaccine and how far along is it?
Reference
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