Researchers in Brazil testing Corona vaccine Sinovac to varian Gamma. They found the Sinovac vaccine to be less effective against the Corona Gamma variant.
Quoted from Channel News Asia, researchers say the antibodies produced by the Sinovac vaccine work less well against the Gamma variant than other variants. The Gamma or P1 variant of the Corona virus is a variant of concern that was first discovered in Brazil.
“The (Gamma) virus has the potential to circulate in vaccinated individuals, even in areas with high vaccination coverage,” said researchers from Brazil’s Campinas University.
In the study conducted in small groups, researchers looked at antibodies in the blood plasma of 53 people who were vaccinated and 21 people who had previously been infected with the virus.
In the group that had received the vaccine, 18 people received one dose of CoronaVac vaccine, 20 people had received two doses. The rest, 15 people were vaccinated in August 2020 at the time of the Sinovac vaccine clinical trial in Brazil.
They found the Gamma variant could escape antibodies in nearly all of the participants who received only one dose.
The study, published in the journal The Lancet Microbe, also found that antibodies produced by previous infections had to be nine times higher to prevent infection by Gamma than other variants.
The good news, researchers say clinical trials show that the Sinovac vaccine is still effective in preventing severe illness and death. The CoronaVac vaccine itself was approved by the WHO in June 2021, where the agency said the vaccine’s efficacy was 51 percent against symptomatic disease and 100 percent against hospitalization.
The authors say there are limitations in this trial including that participants were under 60 years of age and low risk, calling for further research to test efficacy among adults older and under 18 years of age, as well as against the new variant.
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