By Minyvonne Burke and Reuters via
NBC News
The COVID-19 vaccines from Johnson & Johnson, China's Sinopharm and Russia's Sputnik V have lower efficacy against the new omicron variant, according to a new study.
The research, which has not yet been reviewed by other scientists, also found that the decline in the effectiveness of these vaccines is less pronounced in
immunized people who had previously been infected
with the coronavirus.
Vials of Russian vaccine Sputnik V against COVID-19 Antonio Calanni / AP
The omicron variant, with a high rate of transmissibility, has raised the concern of the scientific community and the authorities for its
ability to evade the protection offered by vaccines
.
This has led pharmaceutical companies to adapt their formulas to combat the variant, while the effectiveness of existing vaccines has been tested.
[A wave of infections "like never before" hits New York while the whole country awaits the omicron hit at Christmas]
According to the aforementioned study, Moderna, AstraZeneca and Pfizer vaccines work against omicron, but
the antibody response is considerably reduced
compared to the original strain of the coronavirus virus detected in China.
The omicron variant is highly contagious and has more than 30 mutations of the coronavirus spike proteins, which coat the outside of the virus and are the main targets of vaccines and treatments such as monoclonal antibodies.
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The World Health Organization (WHO) has said that omicron is spreading faster than any other strain of the coronavirus previously detected.
Beyond concerns about its spread, the evidence collected so far shows that it
can cause less severe disease than the delta variant
.
President Joe Biden warned that
"a winter of serious illness and death" is coming
for those who have not yet been vaccinated against COVID-19, amid a surge in delta infections and as omicron spreads.
[Could mRNA vaccines be the next frontier for treating cancer?]
The president made these statements after meeting with his advisers on the pandemic, a meeting in which he stressed that omicron "is spreading now and is going to increase."
Biden said the "good news" is that "if you are vaccinated and have your booster shot, you are protected from serious illness and death."
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