According to the European Medicines Agency (EMA), booster vaccinations against Covid-19 could also be carried out after three months. Notwithstanding the current recommendations to give the booster after six months, “the data currently available suggest a safe and effective booster dose as early as three months after the completion of the primary series,” said EMA Director of Vaccination Strategy Marco Cavaleri on Thursday.
“Such a short distance would be possible if this is” desirable from a public health point of view, “said Cavaleri at a press conference of the authority in Amsterdam.
Germany’s Standing Vaccination Commission (Stiko) recommends that a booster vaccination should be given every six months after the last vaccine dose of the basic vaccination. A shortening of the vaccination interval to five months can, according to Stiko, “be considered in individual cases or if sufficient capacities are available”.
Cavaleri was also optimistic about the early approval of the corona vaccine from the US manufacturer Novavox, which is one of the protein vaccines. It could be done later this year, he said. This would add a fifth to the arsenal of authorized corona vaccines available in the EU.
Experts had already evaluated studies on the effect of Nuvaxovid (NVX-CoV2373) in the ongoing test procedure. Should the EMA recommend conditional marketing authorization, the EU Commission still has to give its final approval, but this is a matter of form.
In contrast to the previously approved vaccines, the Novavax product is neither an mRNA vaccine – like the preparations from Biontech and Moderna – nor a vector vaccine like those from Astrazeneca and Johnson & Johnson. The vaccine contains tiny particles made up of a laboratory-made version of the Sars-CoV-2 spike protein