Booster coronavirus vaccines from Oxford/AstraZeneca and BioNTech/Pfizer should add “considerable protection” against the Omicron variant, new research indicates, but new Omicron-specific jabs may still be needed due to widespread vaccine breakthrough.
Analysis of blood samples from people vaccinated with a third dose of Oxford/AstraZeneca and BioNTech/Pfizer showed that the booster still increased neutralizing antibodies 2.7 fold for Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine and 34.2 fold for the BioNTech/Pfizer jab following a second jab, according to the lab-based research, which is not yet peer-reviewed and was undertaken by researchers from multiple countries including the U.K., China, Israel and South Africa. However, compared to the Delta variant, the number of neutralizing antibodies against Omicron was 3.6 times lower.
The researchers conclude that this means that the “campaign to deploy booster vaccines should add considerable protection against Omicron infection.” However, the difference in the immune response of the jabs to Omicron compared to earlier variants “may mandate the development of vaccines against this strain,” researchers say.
This also goes for drugs to fight COVID-19. Unlike vaccines, the interaction between monoclonal antibodies and Omicron is “so severe that activity is completely lost or severely impaired,” the paper reads. Authors say that the failure of monoclonal antibodies may also lead to a second generation of these drugs to target Omicron.
Vaccine developers are already working on new Omicron-specific jabs. The Financial Times reported on Wednesday that Oxford University and AstraZeneca have started work on an Omicron-targeted version of their jab. BioNTech and Pfizer are also working on an adapted vaccine, 180 million doses of which have already been ordered by the EU.
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