A booster dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine appears to provide strong protection against the omicron variant, the companies have announced.
They said lab study results show a third dose of their vaccine provides a similar level of neutralizing antibodies to omicron, comparable to two doses against the original coronavirus and other variants that have emerged.
Blood samples from those who received only the primary series of the vaccine, on average, did see a 25-fold drop in antibodies against the new variant. That may indicate that two doses of the vaccine may not be sufficient to protect against infection with omicron, although may still prevent severe disease, the companies said.
As the highly mutated omicron variant, first identified in South Africa, spreads around the globe, scientists are racing to determine how the available vaccines will work against it.
