A new study suggests that the XBB.1.5-adapted COVID-19 vaccine is effective in protection against mild COVID-19 in people aged 12 years or older, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said yesterday.
The centers said the COVID-19 positivity rate is considered low globally, but it is still relatively high in the Asia-Pacific and Southeast Asia, and case numbers are still rising in neighboring countries, including Japan and South Korea.
The JN.1 subvariant, a descendant of BA.2.86, has become the dominant strain around the world, accounting for more than 80 percent of cases, and as COVID-19 activity is increasing in Taiwan, genomic surveillance shows the JN.1 strain was also responsible for 69 percent of the sequenced local cases in the past four weeks, it said.
Photo courtesy of Penghu Hospital
Citing the findings of a study by the Canadian Sentinel Practitioner Surveillance Network (SPSN) released on Thursday, the CDC said the XBB.1.5-adapted vaccine’s effectiveness against COVID-19 was about 50 percent — 47 percent for the vaccine recipients aged between 12 and 64, and 52 percent for recipients aged 65 and older — between Oct. 29 last year and Jan. 13.
The study found that among recipients who reported prior
SARS-CoV-2 infection confirmed through a nucleic acid amplification test or rapid antigen test, the XBB.1.5 vaccine’s effectiveness against COVID-19 was even higher at 67 percent, it said.
The CDC said the study is one of the first that analyzed the XBB.1.5 vaccine’s effectiveness among adolescents in the real world, and it found that it is just as effective as among adult vaccine recipients, reducing the risk of developing mild COVID-19 symptoms.
As schools are beginning the new semester and Lantern Festival activities are expected to draw large crowds, which could increase the risk of spreading COVID-19, the CDC encouraged people to get the XBB.1.5 vaccine for better protection against symptomatic infection.
Since the XBB.1.5 vaccine became locally available on Sept. 26 last year, 97 percent of people who were hospitalized and 98 percent of those who died due to COVID-19 had not gotten the XBB.1.5 vaccine, the centers said.
The CDC said that as of yesterday, more than 1.74 million people had received a XBB.1.5 vaccine, including more than 1.54 million people who received Moderna’s vaccine and more than 226,000 people who received the Novavax vaccine.
Both Moderna’s and Novavax’s vaccines are safe and effective against COVID-19, so people aged 12 and older can choose one of the two brands for their vaccine, while children aged six months to 11 years are only eligible for Moderna’s vaccine, the centers said.
Vaccination-related information and vaccination sites can be found at its official Web page for autumn and winter vaccination (https://gov.tw/eU4), it added.
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