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Pfizer and BioNtech have announced that their vaccine is effective against the variant of COVID-19 that has appeared in the UK.
The US pharmaceutical company Pfizer and its German partner BioNtech announced that the COVID-19 vaccine they have jointly developed is effective against the variant of the virus that appeared in the UK in late 2020 and has already spread worldwide. The news was confirmed on Wednesday based on laboratory results.
Pfizer and BioNtech announced that the study was based on ten mutations of the variant of COVID-19, known as B117, which appeared in the UK in November 2020, much more contagious than the type of coronavirus that had hit the planet until then.
The study was signed by Ugur Sahin and Oezlem Tuereci, co-founders of the German company BioNtech. Sahin is the CEO of the company and Tuereci, his wife, is the medical director.
Further data on immune responses following the Pfizer mRNA vaccine against pseudovirus with Spike protein with mutations in the B.1.1.7 variant (del69 / 70, del 144/145, N501Y, A570D, P681H, T716I, S982A, D1118H) . There is a modest reduction in the efficacy of vaccine sera.
– Gupta Lab, Cambridge (@GuptaR_lab) January 18, 2021
Of the 15 subjects with neutralization activity three weeks after the Pfizer mRNA vaccine, 10 showed evidence of reduction in antibody efficacy against the B.1.1.7 mutant (Fold change> 3). The highest fold change was 6. The median fold change was 3.85 (IQR 2.68-5.28). pic.twitter.com/0CvN3qrYw6
– Gupta Lab, Cambridge (@GuptaR_lab) January 18, 2021
The news is encouraging to the scientific community fighting the coronavirus as it implies that vaccine development does not need to be restarted. The UK is going through days of deep bewilderment as it watches mortality rates soar as a result of this variation in COVID-19.
The Pfizer and BioNteh pseudovirus study
Pfizer and BioNtech announced that their coronavirus vaccine is effective against the variant of the virus released in the UK in late 2020. They were based on a trial with 16 volunteers.
All 16 people enrolled in the Pfizer and BioNteh study had already been vaccinated against COVID-19. They were exposed to a synthetic virus called pseudovirus. The pseudovirus designed for this study contained the same protein as the coronavirus variant B117.
The results showed that the antibodies generated by the 16 vaccinated volunteers (Comirnaty, or BNT162b2) eliminated the pseudovirus with the same efficiency with which they defeated the proteins from the previous version of the coronavirus.
Israel questions the effectiveness of Pfizer’s vaccine
Single dose of Covid vaccine in Israel ‘less effective than we thought’ https://t.co/vowqDsY0Lr
– The Guardian (@guardian) January 19, 2021
Israel wondered if the effectiveness of the first dose of Pfizer and BioNtech’s coronavirus vaccine is as effective as the manufacturing companies stated.
Nachman Ash, an Israeli official responsible for designing the anti-pandemic strategy, questioned data from the companies that developed the vaccine.
“Many people have become infected between the first and second doses of the Pfizer vaccine,” he said in a dialogue with Army Radio Tuesday afternoon.
According to figures released by the Israeli Ministry of Health, 12,400 people tested positive for coronavirus after receiving the first dose of the Pfizer and BioNtech vaccines. An additional 69 people were diagnosed with the disease after receiving the second vaccination.
“It appears that the protection provided by the first dose is less effective than we thought.” And he stressed that the data on protection against the SARS-CoV-2 virus after the first dose is “lower than what Pfizer presented,” added Nachman Ash.
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