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The UK has approved two different coronavirus vaccines: one from Pfizer / BioNTech and one from AstraZeneca / University of Oxford.
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Both require two doses, with a few weeks apart.
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The British government suggests that people can mix and match their two COVID-19 shots, if necessary.
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There is an experiment to see how well mixing different shots will work, but there are no results yet.
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With the recordings of both AstraZeneca and Pfizer now allowed for emergency use, the UK has two different COVID-19 vaccines available to combat the pandemic. Both require people to get two shots, with a few weeks apart.
But if people forget which one they got first, or if one or another supplier runs out, the British government now says: no worries.
The British government has suggested that people can mix and match their two COVID-19 shots – and government experts even think there is a chance people could get one day after AstraZeneca’s vaccine is approved for use in the UK. better protection against coronavirus infections that way.
If ‘the same vaccine is not available, or if the first product received is unknown, it is reasonable to offer one dose of the locally available product to complete the schedule’, according to the British Council of Suppliers .
However, both experts and government officials agree that the combination of two vaccines in the hope of providing people with more robust protection against coronavirus infections remains a risky, untested strategy.
The ‘Wild West’ of Vaccination Campaigns
Even the British government writes in its new leadership that “there is no evidence for the interchangeability of the COVID-19 vaccines.”
“We’re kind of in this Wild West,” said Dr. Phyllis Tien, a doctor on infectious diseases at the University of California, San Francisco, told the New York Times. “None of this is currently driven by data.”
It is possible that the mixing of different vaccines could provide people with more robust protection against infection – and government officials in the UK are launching a so-called ‘mix and match’ trial to find out if this is the case.
“The idea is that you can maximize the power of the immune response to protect people,” said Kate Bingham, chairwoman of the UK’s vaccination task force, during a recent briefing.
Britain has so far cleared two different vaccines for emergency use. First, Pfizer / BioNTech’s vaccine received the green light in the UK on 2 December, followed by AstraZeneca / University of Oxford on 30 December. Both of these vaccines are designed to be administered as two shots, with a few weeks apart. But it is not the same vaccination, nor is it summed up.
Pfizer’s vaccine is a new type of messenger RNA vaccine, while AstraZeneca uses viral vector technology. If they work together, it is possible that they can offer people a solid one-two punch of both good cellular (from AstraZeneca) and good antibody (from Pfizer) virus response, as Kate Duffy from Business Insider recently reported.
“Antibodies block the uptake of viruses into cells, and the cellular T cells identify the infected cells and remove them,” Bingham said. “Ideally, you want both.”
But John Moore, a vaccination expert at Cornell University, wants more evidence that strategy can really work before it is recommended.
Moore told the Times that it looks like officials have now completely abandoned science and are just trying to guess their way out of a mess.
Less than 2% of UK population is vaccinated, with a rapidly spreading new variant
The UK has recently been plagued by more coronavirus infections, a wave that is partly fueled by what is thought to be a rapidly spreading coronavirus variant. The new variant, called B.1.1.7, is not lethal, and experts expect vaccines to be successful in fighting it as well.
The country is now urging that as many people as possible be vaccinated with one dose of COVID-19 vaccine before administering their second booster shot.
“At this stage of the pandemic, the priority of the first doses of vaccine will protect the largest number of people on the priority list in the shortest possible time,” British officials said in a statement on Tuesday.
Less than 1.5% of people in the UK have been shot so far, according to Bloomberg’s COVID-19 vaccine detection.
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