Single Dose COVID-19 Vaccine Provides Strong Protection Against Serious Illness | Science

ScienceCOVID-19 reporting is supported by the Pulitzer Center and the Heising-Simons Foundation.

Less than 24 hours after small biotech Novavax announced the largely successful results of its COVID-19 vaccine, pharmaceutical giant Johnson & Johnson (J&J) said its candidate also had high efficacy against the pandemic coronavirus, including included several new variations which have scientists concerned. In a press release this morning, the company reported 85% effectiveness in preventing severe cases of COVID-19, including comprehensive protection against hospitalization and death from 28 days after administration of the dose. Unlike other COVID-19 vaccines with proven protection that were designed to include a booster dose weeks later, J&J relied on a single-dose strategy, which could help dramatically increase the number of people immune to it. SARS-CoV-2.

Some protection was seen as early as 14 days after the dose and by day 28 the overall efficacy against any COVID-19, mild or severe, was 72% among trial participants in the United States, 66% in Latin America and 57% in South Africa, the company said. The results are based on an interim analysis of the ongoing efficacy trial, but they appear strong enough to meet the threshold for emergency use clearance in many countries. They do not match the greater than 90% effectiveness of two-dose messenger RNA vaccines from Moderna and the Pfizer-BioNTech collaboration, but many countries will likely welcome J & J’s candidate given the scarcity of other COVID-19 vaccines. .

“These first results with a single injection COVID-19 vaccine candidate represent a promising moment. The potential to dramatically reduce the burden of serious disease, by providing an effective and well-tolerated vaccine with a single vaccination, is a critical part of the global public health response, ”Paul Stoffels, vice chairman of the executive committee and scientific director at J&J said in the company statement. “A single-dose vaccine is viewed by the World Health Organization as the best option in pandemic situations, improving access, distribution and compliance.

The J&J vaccine was developed by its Janssen division and strongly supported by the US government. It centers an engineered version of adenovirus 26 (Ad26), which normally causes the common cold but has been turned off so it cannot replicate. Company scientists sewn into this “vector” a gene for the peak, the surface protein of SARS-CoV-2. Janssen is testing this same Ad26 platform in vaccines against Ebola, HIV, respiratory syncytial virus and Zika. J&J had pharmaceutical sales of $ 42 billion in 2019, making it the sixth largest pharmaceutical company.

This is a developing story and will be updated.