By Sabela Ojea

Moderna secured a $590 million package from the U.S. Health and Human Services Department to accelerate the development of its bird influenza vaccine as concerns about a bird flu pandemic in humans grows.

The financial package will fund the expansion of clinical studies for up to five additional subtypes of bird influenza and provide additional support for late-stage development and licensure of pre-pandemic mRNA-based vaccines, the biotechnology company said Friday.

Highly pathogenic avian influenza has been rampant in poultry farms in the U.S. and there have been several recent human cases in dairy and poultry workers, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The current public health risk is currently low, but the CDC is watching the situation carefully and working with states to monitor people with animal exposures.

The financial support from the federal government comes ahead of President-elect Donald Trump's inauguration on Monday, and at a time when Moderna is preparing to advance its mRNA-1018 investigational pandemic influenza vaccine into a Phase 3 trial.

The company plans to present the data at an upcoming medical meeting.

In 2023, Moderna initiated a phase 1/2 study to generate safety and immunogenicity data of the bird influenza shot in healthy adults aged 18 and older. The trial included vaccine candidates against two avian influenza viruses, H5 and H7.

The development of the bird flu vaccine could help buoy Moderna's financial results after the company provided an update for revenue in 2025 that disappointed the market as sales for its vaccines against Covid-19 and respiratory syncytial virus continue to be sluggish.

This past March, an outbreak of bird flu in dairy cows was first reported in Texas and Kansas, and in December California declared a state of emergency due to the rising cases of bird flu that had been detected in the state's dairy cows.

The most recent cases of bird flu were first detected in the U.S. in the wild bird population in South Carolina in January 2022, according to the California government.

Since 2022, 67 total human cases of avian influenza virus infection have been identified in the U.S., including 66 cases in 2024, according to the CDC.

Write to Sabela Ojea at sabela.ojea@wsj.com; @sabelaojeaguix

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

January 17, 2025 18:07 ET (23:07 GMT)

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