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Vaccines

Booster shots prove very effective

Third doses are pushing covid-19 protection to impressive heights
Clare Wilson

THE outlook for the covid-19 according to an analysis by the Several other vaccines require make the best antibodies survive
pandemic took a downwards UK Health Security Agency three doses, such as the one against and replicate, so as a result, their
turn last week, when the omicron (UKHSA). “It’s really impressive,” the liver infection hepatitis B. progeny make ever-stronger
variant was announced as a says Paul Hunter at the University Giving sequential doses takes antibodies. “With other
variant of concern (see page 7). of East Anglia, UK. advantage of the fact that when we infections, the third booster
But there is a cause for some The most recent results from repeatedly encounter a pathogen protects you for longer and also
optimism: emerging evidence the UKHSA suggest that, in the gives you antibodies that have
on vaccine booster programmes over 70s, for example, protection “With other infections, higher affinity,” says Hunter.
reveals that a third dose can take levels are now higher than a third dose protects you This is good news for the many
people’s coronavirus protection they were in August, and seem for longer and gives you countries rolling out booster
to unexpectedly high levels. to be continuing to rise. higher affinity antibodies” programmes. But information
It has long been predicted People such as Anthony Fauci, on the effectiveness of a third
that the covid-19 vaccines from the White House chief medical or vaccine, our antibody-making dose all relates to the delta variant,
Oxford/AstraZeneca and Pfizer/ adviser, have said the covid-19 cells undergo a process called so how does the emergence of
BioNTech, which were designed vaccines should be seen as “affinity maturation”. omicron change things?
as two-dose regimens, may requiring a three-dose regimen Our antibodies are made Much about omicron is still
eventually require a third shot. as standard. “A booster isn’t by immune cells called B-cells, unclear, but if it does replace delta
After studies suggested that an add-on – a booster is part and during affinity maturation, as the dominant covid-19 variant,
vaccine effectiveness was waning, of what the original regimen these multiply within the body’s its genetic sequence suggests that
many countries began booster should be,” he said at a lymph nodes while undergoing the existing covid-19 vaccines may
programmes, including the UK, conference in November. mutations. Only the B-cells that be less effective. That doesn’t mean
which began offering third doses vaccines will become useless,
in September to people who are though. “Vaccination is still likely
50 or older and certain other to protect you from severe
groups. It later widened that disease,” Calum Semple, a member
to those aged 40 and over. of the UK government’s Scientific
There was disappointment that Advisory Group for Emergencies,
boosters were needed after only told the BBC on 27 November.
six months, but the initial signs That means encouraging as
for how well third jabs are working many people as possible to take
have been no let-down. In October, the full three-dose course of
a randomised trial found that vaccines is still a good plan of
people who had received a third action for tackling any covid-19
dose of the Pfizer/BioNTech variant, whether delta or omicron.
vaccine had about 95 per cent On 29 November, the UK’s Joint
fewer infections than people Committee on Vaccination and
who had only had two jabs. Immunisation said that anyone
While vaccine effectiveness 18 and over can have a booster, in
tends to be lower in the wider order of descending age groups,
world than in trials, real and the required interval between
world figures have also been second dose and third has shrunk
encouraging. In people over from six months to three. The
the age of 50, those who had a same day, the US Centers for
booster were about 93 per cent Disease Control and Prevention
less likely to have a symptomatic said everyone aged 18 and older
infection than those who were should get a booster too.
MAUREEN MCLEAN/SHUTTERSTOCK

unvaccinated, regardless of “If you’re boosted, your

whether their first two jabs were response is likely to be stronger
AstraZeneca or Pfizer/BioNTech, so it’s more vital than ever that
people get their jabs and we get
A road sign in those boosters into arms as fast as
Buckinghamshire, UK, possible,” said UK prime minister
in mid-November Boris Johnson on 27 November. ❚

8 | New Scientist | 4 December 2021