There’s been a lot of fuss around the coronavirus vaccines lately, and most of the controversies were revolving around the AstraZeneca vaccine.
Now, it’s time for Pfizer to “shine” in the spotlight following the latest news!
CNBC just revealed that the coronavirus variant first discovered in South Africa is able to evade some of the protection of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, according to a new Israeli study, which has not yet been peer-reviewed.
“Researchers at Tel Aviv University and Clalit, the largest healthcare organization in Israel, examined nearly 400 people who had tested positive for Covid-19 after receiving at least one dose of the vaccine. They compared them to the same number of people who were infected and unvaccinated,” the online publication mentioned above notes.
New variant breaks through Pfizer’s vaccine
The data has been published online over the weekend, and it suggests that the B.1.351 is better able to “breakthrough” the protection of the vaccine than the original strain, the researchers wrote in the study.
“Based on patterns in the general population, we would have expected just one case of the South African variant, but we saw eight,” Professor Adi Stern, who headed the research, told The Times of Israel.
He continued and said: “We can say it’s less effective, but more research is needed to establish exactly how much.”
Coronavirus in the news
In other recent news, it’s been revealed not too long ago that thousands of health care workers across North Carolina, charged with the care of patients, have declined to get COVID-19 vaccinations, even as eligibility has opened to the entire state.
According to the latest reports, hospitals that were willing to disclose employee vaccination rates revealed that between 40% and 75% of hospital staff members had been vaccinated, an NC Watchdog Reporting Network survey shows.
Stay tuned for more news.
