The drugmaker said early trials showed both vaccines produced immune responses that were inferior to those seen in people who had recovered from Cove in 19 and those report for other coronavirus vaccines.

Merck will record pretax charge for the two vaccines in the fourth quarter.

The new sent its shares down about 1% in early trading Monday.

Mark was a late comer in the race.

To begin with, it acquired one vaccine candidate by buying Austrian vaccine maker Theme Assed Bioscience.

It developed the other one with a nonprofit research organization.

Rivals Pfizer and its German partner Beyond Tech as well as Madonna, have already produced tens of millions of doses that have been administered globally.

Others, like Johnson and Johnson and AstraZeneca are racing to develop safe and effective vaccines to protect against the virus.

Merck says it will now focus pandemic research on treatments.

It expects to produce early data on an experimental Orel antiviral by the end of March.