China CDC supports mix-and-match booster vaccine dose
Chinese health authorities have voiced support for use of heterologous Covid-19 vaccination or the administering of a booster vaccine different from shots used for primary inoculation.
News portal CodeBlue quoted Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (China CDC) director-general Prof George Fu Gao as saying that additional shots are necessary against the decline of protective antibodies over time after the initial vaccination doses...
Chinese health authorities have voiced support for use of heterologous Covid-19 vaccination or the administering of a booster vaccine different from shots used for primary inoculation.
News portal CodeBlue quoted Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (China CDC) director-general Prof George Fu Gao as saying that additional shots are necessary against the decline of protective antibodies over time after the initial vaccination doses.
"Scientifically, we have so many trials already. We’re thinking about heterologous, sequential vaccination — using one vaccine to prime and then a second heterologous vaccine to do the booster jab.
"It's still science. We still need to collect more data to see whether or not it would work, but by immunology and science, it would work. This is something we should think about," Gao reportedly said at the virtual Global Town Hall 2021 organised by the Foreign Policy Community of Indonesia last weekend.
Initially an epicentre of the Covid-19 pandemic, CodeBlue quoted Gao as saying that high-risk groups in China have been receiving their booster dose beginning last month.
"By Nov 18, approximately about 80 percent of high-risk people have already been booster vaccinated," said Gao whose areas of studies include virology and immunology, as well as inter-species pathogen transmission.
Earlier this month, South China Morning Post reported that China will soon lift its restriction on mixing and matching of vaccines, aiming to introduce an "optimal immunisation combination."
Better results
China's National Health Commission official Zheng Zhongwei was quoted as saying that local authorities believe better results will be achieved in the prevention of severe illness and death by boosting immunisation with the same or different technological platforms, regardless of coronavirus variants.
"So we will introduce an optimal combination of booster vaccines… and I think we should see the results soon,” Zheng was quoted as saying.
In Malaysia, the Health Ministry has defended its decision to endorse the Covid-19 vaccine from Pfizer-BioNTech as the preferred vaccine for administering booster shots to people who previously received the Sinovac vaccine.
It also unveiled a proposed plan that would see most vaccine recipients eventually getting a Pfizer booster once given the green light by the National Pharmaceutical Regulatory Agency (NPRA).
Nevertheless, it will still be possible for Sinovac vaccine recipients to receive either the AstraZeneca vaccine or Sinovac for their third dose once this is approved by the NPRA if they are medically unable to receive the Pfizer shot.
Are you sure you want to delete this comment?
This action cannot be undone.