Maccabi Healthcare Services announced on Wednesday that the efficacy of the vaccine in a large Israeli sample of vaccinated individuals had reached 95 percent, exactly as Pfizer had expected in its clinical trials.
It has now fully vaccinated 602,000, and only 608 have been infected, which equates to 1 in 1,000, it reads. Of these, none died.
Only 21 of the infected were admitted to hospital: 11 with mild symptoms, 3 with moderate symptoms and only 7 with severe symptoms. As a result, Maccabi doctors believe that the vaccine not only reduces the number of confirmed patients, but also reduces the severity of illness in those who become ill.
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When Pfizer achieved 95% efficacy in clinical trials, the medical community was impressed, but unsure if it could be repeated in the real world. Maccabi’s data indicates that it may.
“The vaccine’s effectiveness in Israel is stable and high,” said Maccabi statistical analyst Anat Ekka Zohar.
A medical worker prepares a COVID-19 vaccine in Kiryat Yerim on January 25, 2021 (Yonatan Sindel / Flash90)
To measure efficacy, scientists measure infection levels among people who have been at least a week since their second survey, and compare it to the percentage among at-risk people.
Anat Ekka Zohar, statistical analyst at Maccabi Healthcare Services (thanks to Anat Ekka Zohar)
Ekka Zohar believes that the slight increase in effectiveness since last week’s statistics, which brings the effectiveness to 93%, is the fact that many young people are newly vaccinated, and that they respond very well to the vaccine.
Data including young people are considered important as it provides insight into the workings of the vaccine among people with a relatively large amount of social contact. Younger people tend to have more daily interactions than the elderly, which until recently was the priority of Israel’s vaccination campaign.
“We are clearly seeing very low rates of disease in the group of young people who have been vaccinated seven days after the first vaccine,” said Ekka Zohar.
When Israel tried to increase the vaccination rate after a slowdown in the campaign, it urged its people to take note of the new statistics and go to vaccination centers.
“Once again, we call on the entire population over the age of 16 to have them vaccinated quickly and quickly, both adults and young people,” said Ekka Zohar. “The data undoubtedly proves to be the most effective way to defeat the pandemic.”
