It is important to have an ever-broadening understanding of vaccines, both regarding their side effects and their impact on the immune system, the Pécs University Clinical Center said.Continue reading
The Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) shared the entire documentation of the Sinopharm vaccine, developed by China National Biotec Group Company (CNBG). The study, overwhelmingly made up of younger, healthy male volunteers, concluded that the vaccine is 72.8 and 78.1 percent effective against the coronavirus.
The long-awaited phase three clinical trials of the Sinopharm vaccine have finally been shared, showing that it is effective. The large scale study involved 40,832 volunteers from the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Egypt, and Jordan.
Participants were either given two doses within three weeks or a placebo. Two weeks before their second inoculation, significantly more non-vaccinated people had caught the virus than those who were vaccinated at least once.
The study also found that none of the people who were vaccinated were severely afflicted by the virus.
As it has before, the issue arose that very few elderly people took part in Sinopharm’s clinical trials. Bloomberg Quint called attention to the fact that 85 percent of participants were mostly healthy men, fewer than two percent of them were 60 or older.
While the vaccine showed promising results, it continues to be worrying when taking into account the possibility that it may affect elderly people and women differently.
The World Health Organization gave Sinopharm international emergency licensing at the beginning of the month, but it did warn one week prior that it is uncertain of the vaccine’s efficacy on older age groups and people with comorbidities, due to the low number of participants of such demographics.
It would be important to have clear data on the vaccine’s effectiveness on the elderly,
Positive results around Sinopharm’s efficacy are excellent news, and most elderly people have already been vaccinated in Hungary. Still, they have a right to know for certain that the vaccine is effective at their age as well, if they will potentially need to be vaccinated again in the future.
Previously the National Institute of Pharmacy and Nutrition stated that the Chinese vaccine is 79.34 percent effective, but fewer participants were involved in that study, so a slight variation is understandable.
Tamás Menczer, state secretary for communications and international representation, spoke about the results published by JAMA on Facebook, explaining the study’s results and showing support for the vaccine.
In his Facebook post Menczer targeted the allegedly “anti-vaccination opposition,” which he says “has attacked – to this day – the Chinese vaccine. They lied for months, saying for example that the Chinese vaccine does not have full documentation.”
The state secretary’s post is a bit confusing in the context that he is talking about the first time the vaccine’s phase three clinical trials have been shared after months of use. Criticisms began in February, when Hungary began using Sinopharm before its phase three trials had been made available to the public.
With the exception of its demographic implications, the release of the phase three trials of the Sinopharm vaccine show that it is reliable, effective, and safe. Hopefully, further studies will be published in the future, and the vaccine’s impacts on the elderly and people with comorbidities will be monitored.
Featured photo illustration by János Vajda/MTI
