Oxford-AstraZeneca’s vaccine offers “minimal protection” against mild disease from the South Africa variant, scientists say early trials suggest.
A new study, not yet peer reviewed, involved about 2,000 people who were on average 31 years old.
But Prof Sarah Gilbert, Oxford lead vaccine developer, said vaccines should still protect against severe disease.
She said developers were likely to have a modified Oxford jab by the autumn to combat the South Africa variant.
Meanwhile, vaccine minister Nadhim Zahawi told the BBC’s Andrew Marr that a booster in the autumn and annual vaccines could be required to combat variants.
More than 100 cases of the South Africa variant have been found in the UK.
A study outlining early trials, first reported by the Financial Times, suggests the vaccine offered “minimal protection” against mild and moderate disease caused by the variant, the University of Oxford said.
Prof Gilbert told the Andrew Marr Show that current vaccines “have a reduction in efficacy against some of the variant viruses”.
“What that is looking like is that we may not be reducing the total number of cases but there’s still protection in that case against deaths, hospitalisations and severe disease.”
She added: “That’s really important for healthcare systems, even if we are having mild and asymptomatic infections, to prevent people going into hospital with Covid would have a major effect.”
Mr Zahawi, who is overseeing the vaccine rollout, said: “We see very much probably an annual or booster in the autumn and then an annual (jab), in the way we do with flu vaccinations where you look at what variant of virus is spreading around the world, rapidly produce a variant of vaccine and then begin to vaccinate and protect the nation.”
Meanwhile, he said that the UK government has ruled out issuing so-called “vaccine passports” to enable people who have had the jab against coronavirus to travel abroad.
From BBC
