LONDON (AP) – UK health chief welcomes new study suggesting a single dose of COVID-19 Oxford-AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine offers a high level of protection for 12 weeks the second shot, so it can quickly protect more people with a first dose.
Britain’s decision has been criticized as risky by other European countries, but Health Secretary Matt Hancock said on Wednesday that the study “supports the strategy we have taken and shows the world that the Oxford vaccine works effectively”.
Hancock’s comments came after Oxford University launched a study showing that the vaccine reduced the transmission of the virus by two-thirds and prevented severe disease.
Mene Pangalos, executive vice president of biopharmaceutical research and development at AstraZeneca, said no patients had severe COVID-19 or needed hospitalization three weeks after receiving the first dose and that efficacy appears to increase up to 12 weeks. after the initial vaccination.
“Our data suggests you want to be as close as possible to the 12 weeks you can” for the second dose, Pangalos told a news conference.
The study has not yet been evaluated by colleagues and did not address the dosage of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, the other currently used in the UK. Pfizer recommends that its fire be administered 21 days apart and has not approved the British government’s decision. to prolong the time between doses.
But the Oxford investigation was enthusiastically greeted by British officials under pressure to justify their decision to delay the second dose.
“This reduction in transmission, as well as the fact that there are no hospitalizations, the combination of these is very good news. And it strongly supports the strategy we took to have a 12-week gap between doses, “Hancock told Sky News.
Some countries, including France, have authorized the AstraZeneca vaccine only for use in people under 65, saying there is not enough evidence to tell if it works in older adults. Belgium has only authorized it for people aged 55 and under.
However, one of the lead researchers of the Oxford vaccine project, Dr Andrew Pollard, said that “we expect it to be extremely effective in older adults” and said more data should be available in the next few years. weeks.
Pangalos noted that the European Medicines Agency has authorized the vaccine for use by all people over the age of 18.
“How individual countries decide to implement vaccines ultimately depends on them, depending on the supply of vaccines they have,” he said.
The supply of vaccine is a sensitive issue in the European Union, which is unhappy that AstraZeneca has reduced the number of doses it intends to provide to the EU in the short term. The company said last month that it plans to reduce initial deliveries in the EU from 80 million doses to 31 million doses due to low efficiencies at its production plants in Europe.
Since then, it has applied to provide an additional 9 million doses to the bloc of 27 nations, whose leaders are facing criticism over what is perceived as slow progress in inoculating the population.
The UK has the deadliest outbreak of coronavirus in Europe, with over 108,000 deaths and is in its third national blockade as authorities try to contain a new, more transmissible virus variant first identified in the south-east of England.
Other options are also a concern. Public health officials in England are going door-to-door, trying to test all adults in eight targeted communities in an attempt to stop the spread of a new strain first identified in South Africa.
To date, 105 cases of the variant have been identified in the UK, 11 of them in people unrelated to travel abroad. Scientists say there is no evidence that the South African variant is more serious than the original virus, but may be more contagious. There is also concern that current vaccines may be less effective against this variant because it contains a mutation of the typical virus protein that existing vaccines target.
This is a concern because the UK is struggling to vaccinate its own population against the virus. Nearly 10 million people received the first of the two photos, including most people over the age of 80 and those in nursing homes.
Pollard said scientists at Oxford believe the AstraZeneca vaccine will continue to provide protection against new variants of COVID-19, although they are still awaiting data.
He said that even if the virus adapts, “this does not mean that we will not continue to have protection against severe diseases.”
“If we need to update vaccines, then it’s actually a relatively simple process. It only takes a few months, rather than the huge efforts that everyone went through last year to conduct the tests on a very large scale, “he told the BBC.
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