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The Covid-19 vaccine being developed by the University of Oxford produces a similar immune response in both older adults and young adults, and adverse responses were lower among the elderly, British drugmaker AstraZeneca Plc said on Monday.
A vaccine that works is seen as a game changer in the battle against the new coronavirus, which has killed more than 1.15 million people, hit the global economy and shut down normal life around the world.
“It is encouraging to see that immunogenicity responses were similar between older and younger adults and that reactogenicity was lower in older adults, where the severity of Covid-19 disease is greatest,” an AstraZeneca spokesperson told Reuters.
“The results further build the body of evidence for AZD1222’s safety and immunogenicity,” the spokesperson said, referring to the technical name of the vaccine.
The news that older people get an immune response from the vaccine is positive because the immune system weakens with age and older people are most at risk of dying from the virus.
The Financial Times previously reported that the vaccine, developed by Oxford and AstraZeneca, triggers protective antibodies and T cells in older age groups, among those most at risk of contracting the virus.
The Oxford / AstraZeneca vaccine is expected to be one of the first Big Pharma to gain regulatory approval, along with the candidate from Pfizer and BioNTech.
Normal
If it works, a vaccine would allow the world to return to some normalcy after the tumult of the pandemic.
Immunogenicity blood tests performed on a subset of older participants echo data published in July that showed the vaccine elicited “strong immune responses” in a group of healthy adults ages 18 to 55, the Financial Times reported. .
Details of the finding are expected to be published shortly in a clinical journal, the FT said. He did not name the publication.
Oxford vaccine
British Health Secretary Matt Hancock said a vaccine was not yet ready, although he was preparing logistics for a possible deployment.
“I would expect most of the deployment to be in the first half of next year,” Hancock told the BBC.
When asked if some people could get a vaccine this year, he told the BBC: “I don’t rule that out, but that is not my central expectation.”
“We want to be prepared in case everything goes perfectly, but it is not my main expectation that we do it this year, but the program is progressing well, we are not there yet,” Hancock said.
Called AZD1222 or ChAdOx1 nCoV-19, the vaccine was developed by scientists at the University of Oxford and licensed to AstraZeneca in April, which took on the task of scaling up trials and production.
The vaccine is likely to provide protection for about a year, Chief Executive Pascal Soriot said in June.
Ireland
Just over half of the Irish would receive the Covid vaccine …
The British drugmaker has signed several supply and manufacturing agreements with companies and governments around the world as it approaches to report the first results of an advanced stage clinical trial.
AstraZeneca resumed the US trial of the experimental vaccine after approval by US regulators, the company said Friday.
Staff at a London hospital trust have been told to be ready to receive the first batches of the vaccine being developed by Oxford University and AstraZeneca Plc, The Sun newspaper reported Monday.
The Sun said the hospital, which was not identified, was told to prepare for the vaccine beginning in the “week beginning November 2.”
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