A real-world test of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine in more than half a million people confirms that it’s very effective at preventing serious illness or death, even after one dose.
Wednesday’s published results, from a mass vaccination campaign in Israel, give strong reassurance that the benefits seen in smaller, limited testing persisted when the vaccine was used much more widely in a general population with various ages and health conditions.
The vaccine was 92% effective at preventing severe disease after two shots and 62% after one. Its estimated effectiveness for preventing death was 72% two to three weeks after the first shot, a rate that may improve as immunity builds over time.
It seemed as effective in folks over 70 as in younger people.
“This is immensely reassuring … better than I would have guessed,” said the Mayo Clinic’s Dr. Gregory Poland.
Vanderbilt University’s Dr. Buddy Creech agreed: “Even after one dose we can see very high effectiveness in prevention of death,” he said.
Neither doctor had a role in the Israel study but both are involved in other coronavirus vaccine work.
Both doctors also said the new results may boost consideration of delaying the second shot, as the United Kingdom is trying, or giving one dose instead of two to people who have already had COVID-19, as France is doing, to stretch limited supplies.
“I would rather see 100 million people have one dose than to see 50 million people have two doses,” Creech said. “I see a lot of encouragement on one dose” in the results from Israel, which were published by the New England Journal of Medicine.
The vaccine, made by Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech, is given as two shots, three weeks apart, in most countries.
The study was led by researchers from the Clalit Research Institute and Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Israel, with Harvard University in the U.S. It did not report on safety of the vaccine, just effectiveness, but no unexpected problems arose in previous testing.
Researchers compared nearly 600,000 people 16 and older in Israel’s largest health care organization who were given shots in December or January to an equal number of people of similar age, sex and health who did not receive vaccine. None of the participants had previously tested positive for the virus.
The vaccine was estimated to be 57% effective at preventing any symptoms of COVID-19 two to three weeks after the first dose, and 94% a week or more after the second dose.
Effectiveness was 74% after one shot and 87% after two for preventing hospitalization, and 46% and 92% for preventing confirmed infection. Reducing infections gives hope that the vaccine may curb spread of the virus, but this type of study can’t determine if that’s the case.
There were 41 COVID-19-related deaths, 32 of them in people who did not get vaccine.
Overall, the numbers compare well to the 95% effectiveness after two doses that was seen in the limited testing that led U.S. regulators to authorize the vaccine’s emergency use, Poland said. How much benefit there would be from one dose has been a big question, “and now there’s some data” to help inform the debate, he added.
“Maybe the right thing to do here to protect the most number of people … is to give everybody one dose as soon as you can. I think that’s a very acceptable strategy to consider,” Poland said.
Israel now has vaccinated nearly half of its population. A newer variant of the virus that was first identified in the United Kingdom became the dominant strain in Israel during the study, so the results also give some insight into how well the vaccine performs against it.
Earlier this week, two U.K. studies suggested benefits even after one dose of the Pfizer vaccine or a different one from AstraZeneca. The U.K. is delaying the second shot for up to 12 weeks after the first one to try to give more people some level of protection.
(AP)
Join the official YWN WhatsApp status
8 Responses
I think there is a typo here. This study was done on Pfizer AND Moderna.
This content is from Advertising Central with no serious information. These statistics are narrower than they appear, which is most of the point. First of all, the cv virus has never actually been isolated, so what the experimental cv vaccines are creating is treatment for a supposed set of typical virus symptoms. Additionally, this relief does not last–these vaccines require frequent subsequent doses, as ‘booster shots’. More important yet, each dose places a potent load of toxic material directly into the blood, including the primary ‘anti-virus’ chemicals, stimulant ‘adjuvant’ chemicals, as well as preservatives of several types.
Additionally yet, this disclaimer alone should be enough of a warning that the entire announcement is dangerous hogwash: “It did not report on safety of the vaccine, just effectiveness…”. What?!
…And this continuation to lull the complacent reader back to trusting sentiment: “but no unexpected problems arose in previous testing”. What was the extent of the previous testing? Where is the documentation for it? Whose assessment is being shared? Not truly to be trusted!
So how many of us YWN commenters are going to read the study when our copies of The New England Journal of Medicine Arrive?
Thank you, Israel, for sharing your important data.
Everyone needs to get vaccinated as soon as they are eligible and vaccine is available.
lastword – please do not spout a load of antivax hogwash here.
The virus HAS been isolated, and the Pfizer vaccine consists of mRNA – not a “potent load” of “toxic material”. The way it works is that the mRNA tells the body to manufacture a set of proteins that are in and of themselves harmless, but that also form part of the coronavirus “spike” that is used to get the coronavirus’s genetic material into the cell. The mRNA itself is then destroyed by the body in the normal course of events, as is always the case with mRNA, but the protein created “trains” the body’s immune system to recognize coronavirus – which it can then destroy. This is all basic information, which anyone can easily find – there is nothing hidden here.
As to the study not reporting on safety – of course it didn’t, since safety was strictly checked in the clinical trial phase, so there’s no need to check it again. At the time the emergency approval for the vaccine was granted, there was widespread disclosure that the safety data was as extensive as any done in any study of a new treatment – the only point that was not quite as solid as what is standard was the efficacy data, where they had good data, but data that was not as extensive as generally the case. That point is what’s being addressed by this article – they’re saying that they now have additional evidence of efficacy.
As to the fact that a booster may be needed – so what? It won’t be the only vaccine that needs a booster, and given the potential damage to health that can be caused by COVID (not even taking the possibility of death into account), it’s a small cost.
So please, you and everyone here, educate yourself with REAL information and know how to debunk the hairbrained conspiracy theories put forth by anti-vaxers.
an Israel Yid
Wish they would publish studies in regards to adverse reactions
@anIsraeliYid
The virus has NOT actually been isolated, and as I mentioned in my initial post, therefore the treatment is for a supposed set of typical virus symptoms. Please do your research and state your supposed references. However, no pharmaceutical company or government body, or anyone else has actually claimed that the cv virus was ever actually isolated.
Additionally, your explanation is abstract science fiction. The mRNA vaccine is totally experimental and there is quite legitimate fear of genetic mutations from it as well as myriad other adverse effects–short term AND long term. All approval for it is from experimental use licensing only–and with no onus of potential liability, both for side effects of any sort, or even for death. The only surety about it is the money trail leading back to the patent holders and the manufacturers and shareholders–including Netanyahu by the way. The way it works is that it doesn’t–it stimulates and thereby virtually forces the immune system to respond to it through aluminum, mercury and other adjuvants, and these and the other ingredients cause a stress for the body. This stress can create or exacerbate auto-immune, carcinogenic, and other disorders.
An additional problem is how cv is assessed–the PCR test was not meant as a diagnostic test–it even says so on the instructions! The results are for typical virus symptomology–because the virus has never actually been isolated! The test is amplified different amounts around the globe–there is no standard. Thus, an ‘outbreak’ of cv can be created this way by sheer whim if desired. The more ‘outbreak, the more cv assessment and the more funded ‘treatment-money’. This is sponsored by elected (and other) legislators with tax-payer money. When the ‘right’ coffers are full enough for awhile, the ‘amplifications’ done through the testing apparently is lowered, and ‘clusters’ are created elsewhere. The more vaccine compliance, the less rigorously they amplify the testing, and the less cases. Unfortunately, the more 5G radiation and various other probable actual causal factors, the more symptomatic cases that do reflect autoimmune weakening–which is the ongoing problem.
lastword – your “facts” are flat-out LIES. In about 30 seconds of googling “isolation of coronavirus”, I found an article on the NIH website (the sixth result down) which described how the virus had been isolated in patients in Wuhan in the early days of the pandemic. The specific description of the procedure given in the article is “Upper and lower respiratory tract secretion samples from putative patients with COVID-19 were inoculated onto cells to isolate the virus. Full genome sequencing and electron microscopy were used to identify the virus.” In fact, I recall that the full DNA sequence of the virus was mapped and distributed by China early in the process – something that would have obviously been impossible without first isolating the virus.
Re: the way mRNA works in the body – you are correct that mRNA vaccines are new, and that this is the first time they are being used. However, the function and effect of mRNA in the body is something that is very well understood – mRNA carries messages to the ribosome (the part of the cell that synthesizes proteins) to tell the ribosome to make a particular protein, with the mRNA is then destroyed after the message has been received. The mRNA does NOT, at any point in the process, change the DNA in the cells. The novelty being used by the mRNA vaccines is that the mRNA in the vaccine instructs the ribosome to manufacture a protein that is identical to a section of the coronavirus particle – which the body then recognizes as foreign, and therefore learns to destroy. While this pre-training of the immune system is classic to ALL vaccines, some of which have been around for over a century, what is new is exactly HOW the particular “training molecule” is created in or introduced to the body – older vaccines used a “vector” to get the necessary training molecule into the body, while mRNA vaccines instruct the body to manufacture the molecule itself. Aluminum and mercury have nothing to do with the process – and in fact, there is NO aluminum or mercury in the Pfizer vaccine (you can google that as well – I googled “is there aluminum in covid 19 vaccine” and found multiple articles on the topic).
Your final set of comments on the PCR test being invalid falls away based on the first answer above – the virus HAS been isolated, and therefore CAN be identified and tested for. There are debates about the appropriate degree of amplification to be used in the PCR test, but to say that the test is entirely invalid as a result is pure, unadulterated, hogwash. In fact, you show how ridiculous your whole position is by bringing in “5G radiation and various other probable causal factors” – these are well-debunked positions, if for no other reason than the pandemic has spread widely in places where 5G has not yet been deployed.
Based on your repeating of widely-debunked antivax theories, I don’t know if there’s any hope that you might agree to be vaccinated – though I hope I’m wrong. However, for everyone else out there – PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE go and GET VACCINATED as soon as it is available in your area. I’ve already had two doses – and while there most definitely are side effects (sore arm, some flu-like symptoms), they’re mild and pass in hours to a couple of days – and in addition to protecting my own health, I can feel comfortable that I am B”H not likely to accidentally cause someone else’s death by inadvertantly passing on the virus to them.
Wishing all much health,
an Israeli Yid