COVID-19 | Pfizer says three doses of its vaccine would be effective against Omicron

Preliminary laboratory studies indicate that two doses of the Pfizer / BioNTech vaccine may not provide sufficient protection against the Omicron variant of the coronavirus, but three doses are capable of neutralizing it.

The pharmaceutical firms, in a statement released today, indicated that a group of patients who had received two doses of the vaccine against COVID-19 showed an efficacy against the Omicron variant 25 times less than against the virus in its previous variant.

This “indicates that two doses of the BNTA162B2 vaccine may not be sufficient to protect against infection with the omicron variant,” the statement said.

But preliminary data also indicate that “protection improves with a third dose of our vaccine,” said Pfizer President Albert Bourla.

For his part, Ugur Sahin, president of BioNTech, declared that “the first data indicate that a third dose could offer a sufficient level of protection against the disease in any degree of severity caused by the omicron variant.”

The existing anticovid vaccines are a priori effective against the omicron variant of the coronavirus, which does not seem to lead to a more serious disease, leading scientists from the WHO and the White House told AFP.

The detection of this new variant, announced on November 24 in South Africa and now present in dozens of countries, generated a panic reaction to indications that it was more contagious and fears that it could be more resistant to vaccines.

However, the director of emergencies for the World Health Organization, Michael Ryan, confided in an interview with AFP that vaccines continue to provide protection against this variant, especially against the risk of severe disease.

“We have very effective vaccines that have proven their power against all variants so far, in terms of disease severity and hospitalization,” said Michael Ryan based on preliminary studies.

Agencies