For once, the government did not follow the recommendations of the High Authority for Health (HAS).
People who had Covid-19 before receiving their first injection, which then serves as a full vaccination, should receive a booster dose.
This must be administered at least five months after the previous one, as indicated on a document presented by Olivier Véran during the press conference this Thursday.
"If you have been infected and you have had a dose and you are five months from the last injection, receive a booster," summed up the Minister of Health.
Without this additional dose, and like all other vaccinated adults, the health pass will be deactivated after seven months.
Difference "not significant"
However, this was not the recommendation of the HAS. In a notice made public Friday, November 19, the body recommended not to administer a booster dose to people who had Covid-19 before their primary vaccination. "The data available to date relating to the immune response induced in subjects previously infected and then vaccinated with a single dose of vaccine do not currently lead to recommend the administration of an additional dose in these people, regardless of age. », We could read. It was even indicated “at this stage”, which suggested that this recommendation could evolve.
First point, therefore: a person who was infected before being vaccinated.
Only one dose is needed initially.
The HAS indicates that a booster dose is not necessary, even if the person in question is eligible for it.
2/8 pic.twitter.com/2PoEf8JzcU
- Nicolas Berrod (@nicolasberrod) November 19, 2021
A study by the Institut Pasteur, published this Friday, confirms that "a single dose makes it possible to achieve higher levels of protection than those observed with two doses of Pfizer or Moderna in the absence of a previous infection" (85% versus 67% efficacy against symptomatic infections after six months). The protection is however even stronger for people who have had the Covid then two doses of the vaccine (96%). Professor Arnaud Fontanet, epidemiologist at the Institut Pasteur and main author of this study, however insisted Monday with the Parisian on the fact that this difference was "not significant".
In its opinion of November 19, the HAS nevertheless underlined that a booster dose in the case of "infected then a dose" was "not contraindicated", and that it could "be administered to people. who would like it ”.
In recent weeks, even before the booster vaccination was opened to them, many people had to receive a second dose of the vaccine to avoid quarantine by going abroad.
Because several countries (Canada, United Kingdom, etc.) do not recognize this single-dose vaccination schedule and considered complete in France.