Four teaching hospitals in the Netherlands will investigate whether it is useful to give people who have been vaccinated with Johnson’s corona vaccine a second shot. In principle, one syringe is sufficient for this vaccine, certainly to prevent serious illness from the virus. “Due to the increasing circulation of certain variants of the coronavirus, it is possible that an additional vaccination after one shot of Johnson is necessary,” reports Erasmus MC in Rotterdam.
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The hospital in the port city will investigate the effects of a second dose, together with Amsterdam UMC, Leiden UMC and UMC Groningen. The test subjects who receive a second injection are employees of the four centers. Some of them receive the Johnson vaccine again as a second vaccination. Others receive a dose of the corona vaccines from Pfizer/BioNTech or Moderna.
Mixing vaccines can have a number of potential benefits. Efficacy against the coronavirus is paramount, but if someone can get two shots from different manufacturers, vaccination campaigns become more flexible, says Hugo van der Kuy, head of Pharmacy at Erasmus MC. The vaccination process can then be faster and the impact of delivery problems is less.
Studies into combining vaccines are also underway in other countries. The first foreign studies into combining an AstraZeneca vaccine with another vaccine indicate that this is safe and produces a good immune response.
The researchers want to investigate the effect of combining vaccines against the different variants of the coronavirus. They think the combination “could lead to a broader immune response”. The first results are expected at the end of October.
The Dutch Health Council is also still working on an advice on combining corona vaccines. It is not yet known when that will be released. The Council still has too little information about it and is waiting for research results, including from a large British study into this.
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