Booster vaccination increases antibody level against Omikron significantly
Omikron variant on the advance in Germany
Omikron has arrived in Germany. WELT reporter Daniela Will explains what the current situation looks like.
A third vaccination with the Moderna vaccine significantly increases protection against serious illness with Omikron. According to an analysis by the manufacturer, vaccinated people have about 37 times more antibodies after the booster than after the second vaccination.
EA booster dose with the vaccine from Moderna significantly increases the body’s immune defense against the new Corona variant Omikron, according to the manufacturer. Compared to a double vaccination, the neutralizing antibody level increased by around 37 times after a booster with the approved dosage, said the US company. The researchers had analyzed the antibody level in the laboratory 29 days after the booster vaccination.
A dose of 50 micrograms is approved for booster for most people, which is only half as much as for the first and second vaccination. With a booster vaccination of 100 micrograms, the neutralizing antibody level even increased 83-fold over the same period of time, writes Moderna.
The data, in which 20 people were examined per dose, have not yet been published in a specialist journal. For immunocompromised people, 100 micrograms of the vaccine are approved for boosting.
There is still no data on how long the effects last after being boosted with the Moderna vaccine. The company is already working on the development of an Omikron-specific booster candidate. In order to examine the effect of a vaccine against a virus variant, researchers usually do so-called neutralization tests.
It is checked how many antibodies a vaccinated person has in the blood, which can bind to a – mostly artificially produced – virus variant and thus switch it off. The actual protection of vaccinated persons cannot be determined with this, however, clinical studies with thousands of test persons or evaluations of the ongoing infection process are required.
The vaccine manufacturers Biontech and Pfizer had previously announced that three doses of their product were necessary for adequate protection against the Omikron variant. According to initial laboratory data, two doses did not provide sufficient protection against infection with this variant. However, the companies assumed that protection against serious illness would continue to exist.
Last week, Moderna published a study according to which vaccinated people had significantly fewer neutralizing antibodies against Omikron than against certain earlier variants in their blood four weeks after the second dose.
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