What happened
Thursday was a forgettable day on the market for a great many stocks, and that includes high-profile vaccine-developer Moderna (MRNA 0.82%). Although there was some mildly encouraging news coming from the front lines of the battle against the coronavirus, investors just couldn't get that excited about the biotech's shares. As a result, their price posted only a narrower decline than the S&P 500 index on the day.
So what
That good(ish) news came from the government's Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which announced that roughly 3.9 million Americans had received updated COVID-19 vaccines over the preceding week. Moderna, still a leading coronavirus-jab maker, recently released a bivalent booster that aims to block both the original coronavirus and its omicron variants. The latest tally says that a total of 11.5 million people in this country have received an updated booster.
While it's heartening that millions of folks are taking time out of their lives to get yet another COVID shot, the numbers aren't all that impressive, given the population of this country. The CDC calculates that there are 215.5 million individuals within our borders who are eligible for such a booster (i.e., they have finalized their primary set of jabs). That 11.5 million figure is barely over 5% of the total.
Now what
The CDC also pointed out that healthcare-researcher the Kaiser Family Foundation conducted a poll that showed almost two-thirds of American adults don't plan to get COVID boosters. That's particularly discouraging for Moderna, as the company's Spikevax vaccine is its only commercialized product.
Although Moderna's vaccines have been extremely successful, the pandemic continues to fade, and the company will soon need fresh sources of revenue.
