Coronavac, the vaccine developed by the Chinese laboratory Sinovac, is less effective against the Lambda, Gamma and Alpha variants, according to a study released by the University of Chile. Of these three variants, gamma and alpha are of concern to the World Health Organization, because it can increase infections in the world.
According to research from the University of Chile, the lambda variant is the one further reduces the neutralizing capacity of the antibodies generated by Coronavac, decreasing its effectiveness 3.05 times.
The virologist who led the study, Ricardo Soto, explained that most of the vaccines against covid-19 were designed with the ancestral lineage referencei.e. the original virus that started from Wuhan, and its response “not guaranteed” with new variants.
It also points out that the effectiveness of this vaccine against the Gamma variant was reduced by 2.33 times (colloquially Brazilian variant) and decreased 2.03 times its utility against Alpha (known as the British).
“If our body is presented with a changed virus, it is highly probable that not all the neutralizing antibodies that we have generated thanks to vaccines can combat it,” said the academic.
When SARS-CoV-2 mutates, it changes its spike protein, he added, and sometimes “the new characteristics of this protein confer on the virus the power to escape antibodies“.
The study, published on the scientific dissemination platform medRxiv, was carried out in 75 vaccinated patients with the two doses from the Sinovac laboratory in Chile and did not contemplate the delta variant, which already circulates in at least 92 countries for being the most contagious.
According to the Chilean Institute of Public Health (ISP), the predominant variants in the country are lambda and gamma (Brazilian), the latter considered “of concern” by the WHO, along with Alpha.
“This could explain why there are people vaccinated with two doses of Sinovac -the one that has been used mostly in Chile- who is in serious condition due to covid-19 or that he has died, something that should be corroborated, “concluded the expert.
Chile has been experiencing a wave of infections since March that put the health system on the ropes and despite the fact that the country has deployed one of the fastest vaccination processes in the world, intensive care units continue to have an occupation of more than 90%.
More than 80% of the target population have received one dose and 71% have already received both injections, mostly from Sinovac but also from Pzifer, CanSino and AstraZeneca.
What is the Sinovac vaccine made of?
This vaccine is of inactivated virus, derived from the CZ02 strain of coronavirus, this means that this virus was cultivated, harvested and later inactivated to prevent its replication, concentrated, purified and absorbed with aluminum hydroxide that acts as an adjuvant for the reinforcement of the immune response.
Jorge Baruch Díaz, head of the UNAM Travel Clinic, explains that this vaccine contains the virus in an inactivated form, that is, it cannot reproduce, therefore, covid-19 disease cannot develop.
“This is an inactivated virus, this because it is known how it works that it is introduced through an injection into our body, there are several particles, but if at the moment of being injected our body recognizes it and creates antibodies against that inactivated virus”, he mentioned .
Inactivated viruses do not present security risks, since they are modified so as not to replicate and that modification cannot be changed. These types of vaccines are easy to produce, although high security laboratories are required to produce them because the process requires manipulating active viruses.
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