Moderna said Monday its Covid-19 booster does appear to provide protection against omicron, but the drug company will still be developing a new shot specific to the variant currently surging across the world.

Moderna announced Monday that preliminary laboratory testing showed the booster used in the United States provided higher levels of antibody to fight the virus. Moderna also discovered that the levels of antibodies in booster shots doubled.

This is yet another sign booster shots work well to combat the variant. It has led to a sharp increase in cases since the first reports emerged last month.

FDA approved 50ug booster, which the company claims increases neutralizing antibody levels to omicron by 37 percent compared with pre-boost levels. The company also discovered that 100ug boosters resulted in an 83 percent increase in neutralizing antibodies levels.

According to the company, it will continue to work on developing an omicron specific booster. However, clinical trials are expected for this shot in early 2022.

In a statement, Moderna chief executive officer Stéphane Bancel said the company’s findings should come as “reassuring” news.

“The alarming rise in Covid-19-related cases due to the omicron variation is worrying for all. Bancel said that the data are “reassuring”.

He stated that Moderna would still rapidly move an omicron-specific booster to clinical testing if it became necessary.

“We will also continue generating and sharing data across our booster strategy with public health authorities in order to help these make evidence-based decisions about the best vaccination strategies for SARS-CoV-2,” said he, using an alternative name for the Covid viral.

The company tried several boosters in different dosages. Some of these are still under clinical trial.

The company stated that the safety data of the Phase 2/3 trial on 100 ug booster dose showed that it is “generally safe, well-tolerated”.

According to it, adverse reactions were similar to those experienced after the primary series of two shots. However, there was a tendency to have more severe adverse events when the dose is higher than the 50 ug. 

Moderna’s latest news arrives almost two weeks following the Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 booster shot was found to provide strong protection against the omicron variant earlier this month.

Both companies stated that studies had shown the new strain is more capable of bypassing immunity provided by vaccines.

But, the researchers said it was not clear how the variant could overcome the body’s defenses. The relationship between severe illness and microns is also uncertain.

Pfizer as well as BioNTech are currently in process testing a third dose of their Covid-19 vaccine in an ongoing trial of children ages 6 months to under 5 years after the companies found two doses did not appear to generate a strong enough immune response in some children.