Pfizer data suggests COVID-19 shot protects against South Africa variant | Al Jazeera

Pfizer Inc and BioNTech said new clinical trial data signalled that their COVID-19 vaccine could protect against the new coronavirus variant first discovered in South Africa.

The shot was 100 percent effective in preventing illness among trial participants in South Africa, where the new B1351 coronavirus variant is dominant, the companies said. The South Africa trial was relatively small, with 800 participants.

Pfizer said the rate was derived from a relatively small number of nine infections observed, all in the placebo group.

Separately, the companies said their vaccine is approximately 91 percent effective at preventing COVID-19, citing updated trial data that included participants inoculated for up to six months.

While the new overall efficacy rate of 91.3 percent is lower than the 95 percent originally reported in November for its 44,000-person trial, a number of variants have become more prevalent around the world since then.

Pfizer’s Chief Executive Officer Albert Bourla said the updated result, which includes data on more than 12,000 people fully inoculated for at least six months, positions the drugmakers to submit for full US regulatory approval.

The trial data “provide the first clinical results that a vaccine can effectively protect against currently circulating variants, a critical factor to reach herd immunity and end this pandemic for the global population”, Ugur Sahin, chief executive officer at BioNTech, said in a statement.

• Experts have feared new variants of COVID-19 from South Africa and Brazil may be resistant to existing vaccines and treatment.

Lab tests have previously indicated that BioNTech’s vaccine was less potent but still offered a robust defence against the B1351 variant that first emerged in South Africa.

Still, BioNTech reiterated this week there would likely be a future need for booster shots that specifically address new variants and that the group was preparing to upgrade its vaccine when needed.

BioNTech has said that it started testing a modified vaccine version against the South African mutant in March for early indications on safety and efficacy but a product for a later market release would require yet another redesign and more tests.

The updated trial data would not prompt the company to change that development strategy, a BioNTech spokeswoman said.