United States: Pfizer made an announcement on Saturday that tweaking its COVID-19 vaccine to target the Omicron variant better is safe and works, just days before regulators whether to offer Americans updated booster shots this fall.
Currently, the vaccines used in the United States still offer strong protection against severe COVID-19 disease and death, especially if the individuals have obtained a booster shot. But those inoculation targets the original coronavirus strain, and their effectiveness against any infection dropped markedly when the super-coronavirus strain and their effectiveness against any disease decreased dramatically when the highly contagious omicron mutant emerged.
Now with omicron variant even more transmissible relatives spreading widely, the food & Drug Administration is taking into consideration ordering a recipe change for the vaccines made by both Pfizer as well as rival Moderna in hopes that modified booster could better protect against another COVID-19 spike expected this fall and winter.
Pfizer, as well as its partner BioNTech, studied two different ways of updating their shots, targeting just omicron or a combination booster shot that adds omicron safety to the vaccine.
Pfizer mentioned that both booster approach spurred a substantial jump in omicron-fighting antibodies in a study of over 1,200 middle-aged and older adults who’d already had three vaccine doses.
Along with this, Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla mentioned in the statement, “Based on these data, and we believe we have two very robust omicron-adapted candidates.”
Pfizer’s omicron-only booster sparked the most robust immune response against that variant of the COVID-19.
But many experts say combination shots may be the best approach as they would retain the proven benefits of the COVID-19 vaccine while adding new safety and security against the omicron variant. Pfizer stated a month after people received its combo shot, they had a 9 to 11-fold increase in omicron-fighting antibodies.
That is over 1.5 times better than another dose of the original vaccine.
