Coronavirus: 3 shots of Chinese inactivated vaccine effective against Omicron variant, say researchers
- Patients boosted with the jabs had two fewer days in hospital and in recovery than those who were not vaccinated, according to paper
- ‘Strengthening the protection of middle-aged and senior populations would effectively reduce the burden of the pandemic on public health,’ says Chinese team
“[A] booster dose with inactivated vaccine can provide protection by inducing effective neutralising antibodies against the Omicron variant, reducing the risk of severe disease and ICU admission, and shortening the duration of illness,” they wrote in a paper posted on preprint server medRxiv on Saturday.
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Patients infected during an outbreak in Tianjin early this year who had been boosted with an inactivated vaccine had two fewer days in hospital and in recovery on average than those who were not vaccinated, and the duration was also less than those who had had two shots, said the paper’s authors.
The team included researchers from Tianjin Third Central Hospital, Nankai University and Peking University.
China’s mass vaccination campaign has relied heavily on domestically developed inactivated shots from Sinopharm and Sinovac. Inactivated jabs use dead material from the virus to trigger the immune system.
In February, Chinese regulators approved the mixing of domestic vaccines as boosters to improve immunity against Covid-19, and added two more Chinese-developed shots to the booster roster.
