Waiting for the Omicron vaccine?
Immunologist advises against it - "It just didn't work any better"
Created: 04/12/2022Updated: 04/12/2022 15:06
By: Anna Lorenz
The pandemic has been raging for more than two years now, and the vaccination campaign is still ongoing.
In an interview, immunologist Prof. Dr.
Andreas Radbruch on the extent to which Corona can really be defeated.
Berlin – At the beginning of the pandemic, the call for a vaccine against the corona virus was loud.
Biontech, Johnson&Johnson, Moderna and Co. delivered in record time - millions of people in this country have already been vaccinated, some of them several times.
It was clear from the start that a vaccine, whether using RNA technology or Novavax's now-licensed protein vaccine, would reduce the risk of infection and, in the event of infection, make the disease milder, but immunity could not be guaranteed.
Although a general obligation to vaccinate in Germany is now off the table for the time being, many people are now wondering: How should vaccination continue?
Corona vaccination: how effective is the protection from the syringe?
While Federal Minister of Health Karl Lauterbach is promoting a booster vaccination and the STIKO is also recommending the fourth injection to certain risk groups, studies by the Israeli health authorities now show, as
t-online.de
reports, that even a second booster will not last long.
After just four weeks, the risk of infection with the currently rampant omicron subtype would increase again.
In this respect, the question arises as to whether a half-yearly or even quarterly booster vaccination will now become the new modus operandi in the face of the pandemic.
Corona: Immunologist thinks vaccination makes sense – but does not end the pandemic
In an interview with
t-online.de
, the immunologist Prof. Dr.
Andreas Radbruch, Scientific Director of the German Rheumatism Research Center Berlin (DRFZ), now his assessment of the vaccination issue.
As an advisor to the health committee of the Bundestag, the doctor takes the view that a distinction must be made as to whose arm the syringe ends up in.
Prof. Dr.
Andreas Radbruch, Scientific Director of the German Rheumatism Research Center Berlin (DRFZ).
(Archive image) © Thomas Lebie/imago
While the immune system would be exhausted "in the vast majority of the population", it would make sense for "a very small minority" to be given a further refresher according to the recommendations of the STIKO.
"We are well on the way to 'personal' vaccination recommendations, which I very much welcome," says Radbruch.
However, the immunologist would not wait for the vaccine announced by Moderna, which should protect particularly well against omicron.
"In the first tests on monkeys, Moderna's vaccine, which was adapted to Omicron, worked just as well as the original, but not better." An advantage is therefore not to be expected from the new vaccine.
In general, the question of whether to take the fourth dose of vaccine is an “individual decision”.
However, Radbruch does not consider it likely that the corona pandemic will come to an end in the course of the omicron variant.
"Corona is now becoming endemic," says the Scientific Director of the DRFZ.
"That doesn't mean that everything will be fine, but it gives us a chance to live with it." Radbruch rates the current protection standard for over 60-year-olds who have been vaccinated at least three times as "very good", also with regard to new variants to assume “broad immunity”.
"And if a new variant breaks through this broad protection, we can now very quickly produce new vaccines that also protect us against such variants," says the immunologist.
(askl)