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The South African study results, which suggest the Oxford / AstraZeneca vaccine offers reduced protection against the Covid-19 variant first identified there, are in many ways “exactly what we expected. Chief researcher on the Oxford vaccine trial Professor Andrew Pollard said Tuesday.
I think that might be the clue of the future here: that we’re going to see new variants appear and they’ll spread throughout the population – like most viruses that cause colds every winter – but so many that we have enough immunity To avoid serious illness, hospitalizations and death, we will be fine in the future in the pandemic, ”Pollard told BBC Radio 4.
The first data released on Sunday suggests that two doses of the Oxford / AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine offered only “minimal protection” against mild and moderate Covid-19 of the variant first identified in South Africa. The full study, which has not been published, included around 2,000 volunteers with an average age of 31; about half received the vaccine and the other half received a placebo.
Pollard said the study in South Africa “ absolutely confirms what we know about the biology of the virus, it has to pass between people to survive and it has to mutate to do so and it’s already done in South Africa. South and it will affect mild illness. in people who have been vaccinated. “
“The really important point is that all vaccines – wherever in the world they’ve been tested – still prevent serious illness and death,” Pollard said.
He said the “jury is out” on whether the world needs new vaccines to counter the variants, but that the developers are preparing them in case we do.
South African health officials said on Sunday they had halted the mass launch of the Oxford / AstraZeneca vaccine to collect data on hospitalization rates and see how effective the vaccine was in preventing serious illness in people infected with the South African variant.
Pollard said the South African government had “correctly” rethought how it would deploy the vaccine after initially targeting it at health workers.
He also pointed out that the South Africa study was a small study that looked at young adults who only get mild infections.
What we predicted in this context is that the virus would still be able to cause very mild infections and that is exactly what we saw in this study, ”Pollard said.
“We are the only people to date who have a study that looks at this variant in a population of young people and tells us about the future of this virus – that it will find ways to transmit and cause mild infections. , colds, etc. on, in the people, ”Pollard said.
“The really important question is about severe infection and we didn’t study this in South Africa because that was not the purpose of the study,” he added, noting that “we were specifically asking questions about young adults “.
Commenting on the scrutiny the Oxford / AstraZeneca vaccine has received, Pollard said that “it’s a little confusing to find yourself in the middle of a political debate … we’ve made a huge effort here at the University of ‘Oxford to be transparent in everything we do.
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