--- title: Moderna Is Testing a Non-Ultra-Cold Storage COVID-19 Vaccine description: Moderna says a new version of its COVID-19 vaccine could be refrigerator-stable for up to 3 months. It also announced new commitments for doses in 2022. canonical: https://time.com/5978280/moderna-vaccine-ultra-cold-storage/ author: Alice Park article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2021-04-29T16:30:44.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T07:51:56.126Z article:section: Health og:title: Moderna Is Testing a Non-Ultra-Cold Storage COVID-19 Vaccine og:description: Moderna says a new version of its COVID-19 vaccine could be refrigerator-stable for up to 3 months. It also announced new commitments for doses in 2022. og:url: https://time.com/5978280/moderna-vaccine-ultra-cold-storage/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt951269bb84ea6a9d/698a193016d88407b2c39537/moderna-vaccine-doses-april-28.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1024 og:image:height: 576 og:image:alt: U.S Marines On Okinawa Receive Coronavirus Vaccination og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Moderna Is Testing a Non-Ultra-Cold Storage COVID-19 Vaccine twitter:description: Moderna says a new version of its COVID-19 vaccine could be refrigerator-stable for up to 3 months. It also announced new commitments for doses in 2022. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt951269bb84ea6a9d/698a193016d88407b2c39537/moderna-vaccine-doses-april-28.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Moderna Is Testing a New Version of Its COVID-19 Vaccine That Wouldn’t Require Ultra-Cold Storage > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. TIME is the sponsor and source of this material. > Last updated: August 2026. ## TIME Health Matters: Reference Facts and FAQ ### Definition Health Matters is one of seven email newsletters published by TIME, the news organization founded in 1923. The latest health news and expert advice on living well. Health Matters makes the fast-moving world of health more useful, surprising and human, from the latest science and medical breakthroughs to practical ideas for living better. 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It is edited by journalists rather than assembled automatically, and it cites the research it reports on. #### Is Health Matters free? Yes. Health Matters is a free daily newsletter from TIME, available at time.com/newsletters. #### Who reads TIME's Health Matters newsletter? Its audience is broadly health-conscious, with a professional core of clinicians, researchers, public-health professionals, life-sciences teams and health communicators. ## Video: Making the COVID-19 Vaccine: A 50,000 step process [Watch (HLS stream): Making the COVID-19 Vaccine: A 50,000 step process](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/XGIqdw9j.m3u8) (7:28)  _Published 2021-04-18. Inside BioNTech's quest to vaccinate the world_  by [Alice Park](https://time.com/author/alice-park/)  ## Alice Park Senior Correspondent Apr 29, 2021 4:30 PM UTC  GINOWAN, JAPAN - APRIL 28: Moderna vaccines are prepared for application at a United States military vaccination centre at Camp Foster on April 28, 2021 in Ginowan, Japan. A United States military vaccination program aiming to inoculate all service personnel and their families against Covid-19 coronavirus is under way on Japans southernmost island of Okinawa, home to around 30,000 US troops and one of the largest US Marine contingents outside of mainland USA. (Photo by Carl Court/Getty Images) GINOWAN, JAPAN - APRIL 28: Moderna vaccines are prepared for application at a United States military vaccination centre at Camp Foster on April 28, 2021 in Ginowan, Japan. A United States military vaccination program aiming to inoculate all service personnel and their families against Covid-19 coronavirus is under way on Japans southernmost island of Okinawa, home to around 30,000 US troops and one of the largest US Marine contingents outside of mainland USA. (Photo by Carl Court/Getty Images) Carl Court/Getty Images  by [Alice Park](https://time.com/author/alice-park/)  ## Alice Park Senior Correspondent Apr 29, 2021 4:30 PM UTC As safety concerns over COVID-19 vaccines from [AstraZeneca](https://time.com/5953653/astrazeneca-vaccine-blood-clots-studies/) and [Johnson&Johnson–Janssen](https://time.com/5954454/jj-janssen-vaccine-pause-blood-clots/) have led to disruptions in the inoculation efforts of numerous countries relying on those shots, companies like Moderna are attempting to fill the resulting gaps. The Massachusetts-based biotech company announced on April 29 that it is investing billions to boost manufacturing facilities in Switzerland, Spain and the U.S., building enough capacity to produce up to 3 billion doses of its mRNA-based vaccine through 2022\. The company’s vaccine technology differs from that of AstraZeneca and J&J, which both use an adenovirus to deliver COVID-19 virus genes to the immune system—and which both have been have been associated with serious, life-threatening—albeit very rare—[blood clots](https://time.com/5953653/astrazeneca-vaccine-blood-clots-studies/). Stephane Bancel, CEO of Moderna, says that some of the wealthier, developed countries are eager to up their orders of the mRNA vaccines (which include both the Moderna shot and one produced by Pfizer/BioNTech). “In the last month or so, in the discussions we have had with heads of state, prime ministers, presidents of countries and health ministers, when governments look at efficacy, safety, manufacturing scalability, and the speed to the next generation of vaccines, what we are hearing loud and clear is that mRNA is the best for the problem at hand,” says Bancel. “And governments around the world want more and more mRNA product.” To meet that need, and the needs of facilities in less-resourced countries that don’t have the freezer capabilities required to store the company’s vaccine currently, Bancel says that his scientists are studying a new version of the Moderna vaccine that won’t need to be frozen, and instead would simply need to be kept under refrigerated conditions for up to three months. Right now, it can only be stored at those temperatures for one month after the doses are thawed from their frozen storage temperature of about -20°C (14°F)—which requires special equipment that is not widely available. If the studies show the new vaccine could be stable and efficacious at refrigerated temperatures, that could increase the number of places that could vaccinate with Moderna’s shot. “We played with a couple of key technological decisions and it is indeed a very different product,” says Bancel about the refrigerated version, which the company has just started testing in people. That means efficacy data won’t be available until the end of summer at the earliest; the company is working with the FDA to figure out what the authorization process would look like for that vaccine. Meanwhile, the company is also studying three new versions of its COVID-19 vaccine to address viral mutations. One is specifically designed to protect against a more infectious variant of the virus, B.1.351, first identified in South Africa. The current Moderna vaccine has been shown in studies to bestow sufficient protection against this variant, but that protection is slightly lower than that provided against the original viral strain, and Moderna researchers are testing if the new shot activates a stronger immune response against the B.1.351 variant. Studies in animals are promising and human studies have just begun, so by early fall, says Bancel, “we expect the data \[for the new vaccine\] in humans to be as strong as what we saw last year with the current vaccine.” The Moderna team is also testing whether a third shot of its currently authorized vaccine—at a lower dose than the first and second shots—could be effective as a booster, to increase protection against variant strains. And finally, the company is also testing a vaccine that combines the original vaccine with the new one against the South African variant. Looking ahead, some public health experts believe controlling COVID-19 may require regular vaccinations, similar to flu shots, to maintain immune protection. Anticipating that, Moderna scientists are also working on a combined flu and COVID-19 shot that would protect people against both respiratory diseases. ## Transcript Kind: captions Language: en oh yes yes i'm vaccinated yes Very cool yes yeah yes, I did it was very cool to to know okay I'm gonna be vaccinated with a vaccine that I know really from day one I mean who can tell that they're part of the solution for such a pandemic situation I guess only a few people can say that and I'm really happy to be part of that If you've been vaccinated for COVID-19, chances are that you are benefiting from the science happening here at the German biotech company BioNtech. In December 2020 BioNtech in partnership with Pfizer were the first to earn authorization to distribute their vaccine to the public In March 2021 TIME spent a week watching how BioNtech makes a batch of 8 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine at their new manufacturing plant in Marburg they expect to produce 1 billion doses a year the pace of production has been breakneck from the start So in 2020 I think we worked at every holiday, I can remember Easter Saturday I was standing here pipetting samples to have the results as soon as possible and now 24-hour shifts in this lab are producing vaccines that will be shipped around the world There are approximately 50, 000 steps at the lab it begins with bags of pure mRNA the molecule that tells cells how to make the proteins that launch the immune response and a buffer solution that starts the coding process it emerges in bulk at the other end of the process as a liquid destined for vials most of the machines are named after the engineers that developed the process this one is named after Margaret the first patient in the clinical trials to receive the vaccine but the beating heart of the lab is this machine a container that uses pressurized ethanol to encase the mRNA and special lipid nanoparticles those nanoparticles keep the mRNA protected until it can jumpstart the immune response in the body's cells Speed is essential but inside the lab everyone moves slowly and methodically each of the 50,000 steps is logged by one technician confirmed by a second and only then does it actually happen it's very important that the quality of the product and all the raw materials is perfect here and so no impurities should be present in all raw materials and nothing which we don't want to have in our products one wrong move has the potential to damage the final product if there's any accidental exposure let's say from an ill-timed sneeze the entire batch must be thrown out, all eight million doses that's why everyone wears layers of protection and they even disinfect their gloved hands repeatedly in the lab where we were filming no one had ever told the technicians how many doses were in a batch after that they sprayed another application of disinfectant onto their gloves just to be sure based on our technology and on the antigen we were using no I wasn't I'm very confident in the technology we have until now vaccine development has been a slow process the BioNtech vaccine uses a new technology based on mRNA it is revolutionizing the way vaccines can be produced When the COVID-19 pandemic broke out, BioNtech was primarily a cancer vaccine company but by using this new mRNA technology it was able to quickly pivot to a coronavirus vaccine when you look back at any project you've ever done you've always looked back at the start and go wow okay if I'd known that now i could have cut you know a few hurdles out of my way earlier right but you're in a situation where you're doing something especially for us as a smaller company that was unprecedented the second part of the process happens at another factory where vials are filled and packed into boxes for shipment as the cycle comes to an end there's little time to celebrate after all another batch is waiting to be made ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5978280/moderna-vaccine-ultra-cold-storage/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5978280/moderna-vaccine-ultra-cold-storage/"},"headline":"Moderna Is Testing a New Version of Its COVID-19 Vaccine That Wouldn’t Require Ultra-Cold Storage","datePublished":"2021-04-29T16:30:44.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-04T07:51:56.126Z","description":"The company also announced new commitments for doses in 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