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Elaf from Dubai: Since last year, vaccines against the emerging virus have constituted a window of hope to the whole world, as they may put an end to Corona. However, so far there are still several questions about it: which one proves more effective?
According to a study conducted by Bahrain and researchers from Columbia University, the Chinese company Sinopharm’s vaccine was less effective than others in preventing infection, hospitalization and death, especially among people over 50 years old, according to “Al Arabiya.net”.
Despite high levels of vaccination with Sinopharm, in May Bahrain began giving booster doses to vulnerable citizens using a different injection of the Pfizer vaccine. It also now offers boosters for other vaccines.
The study, which was published online this week, revealed that all the vaccines given since December in Bahrain – which also include Covishield, an Indian-made version of AstraZeneca, and Russian-made Sputnik V – were effective in reducing severe disease compared to the non-resident population. immunized people, according to the Wall Street Journal.
It also showed that the percentage of deaths among all positive COVID-19 cases after vaccination was 0.46% for Sinopharma recipients, compared to 0.15% for Pfizer and 0.03% for AstraZeneca. This trend of infection and hospitalization was consistent, even with the emergence of the delta variant. The results of Sputnik V were average.
For her part, Jalila Al-Sayed Jawad, CEO of Primary Health Care Centers in Bahrain who helped launch the vaccination campaign and participated in the study, said: “They found that there was a significant difference between hospitalization, ICU admission and death for Pfizer compared to Sinopharm, especially in the groups. Older age and in the context of the emergence of the delta variable.
She also explained that “this gives a preliminary indication, but it needs more in-depth analysis to say that this is really better,” adding that a direct comparison between Sinopharm and Pfizer was possible due to the similar age and sex characteristics of the recipients. The study was described as “a unique resource on the effect of different vaccines in one population,” according to the Al Arabiya.net website.
Julian Tang, a clinical virologist and professor of respiratory medicine at the University of Leicester, who is not affiliated with the study, considered that while there are marked differences between the efficacy of vaccines against different variants, it may be misleading to compare results in sequential or staggered deployments without more data on Comorbidities and pre-vaccination infections.
The study acknowledges that overlapping vaccine releases and oversampling of individuals who received the Chinese-made vaccine may have had an impact on the results, but the researchers concluded that such factors were unlikely to explain the very important differences in outcomes.
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