40% of Patients With Weakened Immune System Mount Lower Response to Vaccines

Editor’s note: Here’s an excerpt from an article in The BMJ. To read the piece in its entirety, click here.

Four in 10 people who are clinically vulnerable generate lower levels of antibodies than healthy recipients after two shots of vaccine against SARS-CoV-2, a study has found.

The Octave (Observational Cohort Trial T cells Antibodies and Vaccine Efficacy in SARS-CoV-2) trial is one of the largest in the world to have looked at the response to COVID-19 vaccination in patients who are immunocompromised.

It compared 600 patients, who had a weakened immune system because of their disease process or treatment, with the antibody response of healthy people from the Pitch (Protective Immunity from T Cells in Healthcare workers) study.

The trial included patients with solid organ and haematological cancers, end stage kidney and liver disease, organ transplants and immune mediated inflammatory disease such as inflammatory bowel disease, vasculitis or rheumatoid arthritis — patients who were not included in original vaccine trial data.

Read the entire The BMJ article here.