Israeli health care providers quoted preliminary results from a study of thousands of members on Wednesday, stating that Pfizer/BioNTech’s third dose of the COVID19 vaccine was found to be 86% effective for people over 60. 4,444 Israeli HMO Maccabi, covering a quarter of the country’s 9.3 million population, compared the results of 149,144 people over 60 who received the third dose of the vaccine at least a week ago with the results of 675,630 people who received only two vaccines between January and February. 4,444 Approximately 37 people tested positive for the coronavirus after the third puncture, while 1,064 positive cases were among those who received only two injections, Maccabi said in a statement. He added that the control group had similar demographics.
Maccabi did not provide any information about the severity of the 37 positive cases or whether they had any underlying disease. The Health Maintenance Organization (HMO) did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Pfizer stated that the effectiveness of its vaccine will diminish over time, with the third dose showing significantly higher neutralizing antibodies against the initial SARSCoV2 virus and the highly infectious Beta and Delta variants.
Israel started taking the third dose of Pfizer last month in response to an increase in local infections caused by the Delta variant. Approximately 1.1 million eligible Israelis, medical staff, and others over the age of 50 received the third dose of the vaccine.
The United States and several European countries are expected to start providing boosters for the elderly and people with weakened immune systems, and some countries are considering whether to provide a third dose more widely.
However, given that the other 1.1 million Israelis (about 11% of the total population) have not been vaccinated, Israeli health officials are concerned that cases will continue to rise. Severe cases also continue to increase, most of which are people who have not been vaccinated. According to data from the Ministry of Health
According to data published on Wednesday, according to data per 100,000 people, there are 172 serious cases among people over 60 who have not been vaccinated, while there are 21 serious cases among people in the same age group who have been vaccinated.
Maccabi’s Dr. Anat Ekka Zohar said the third dose “reaffirmed its efficacy” and “demonstrated the protective effect (against) the Delta variant.”
“The triple dose is the solution to stop the current outbreak of infection,” he said.
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