New study: How protective is the Pfizer vaccine against the Indian variant

Pfizer vaccine slightly less effective against Indian variant of virus, but still protective, study shows

Reuters and Agence France-Presse reported that a study by the Pasteur Institute in France showed that the Pfizer New Crown vaccine is slightly less effective against the highly infectious Indian variant of the virus, but is still protective.

Study co-author Schwartz, director of the Pasteur Institute, said, “Despite the slight decrease in effectiveness, the Pfizer vaccine is likely to remain protective.” The study was published on the bioscience website bioRxiv on the 27th before being submitted for peer review.

The study sampled 28 health care workers in the north-central French city of Orléans, 16 of whom had received two doses of the Pfizer vaccine, while the remaining 12 had received the first dose of the two-dose British Astellicam (AZ) vaccine.

Schwartz said that patients who recovered after contracting the new crown in the past year, as well as those who received two doses of Pfizer vaccine, had antibodies against the Indian variant of the virus that were one-third to one-sixth as potent as those against the British and South African variants, indicating that “the Indian variant of the virus … has developed partial resistance to antibodies “.

Schwartz said that for those who received one dose of AZ vaccine, the antibodies in their bodies had “little to no inhibitory effect” on the Indian variant of the virus.