Single jab to beat mutants
Similarities between the strains could mean just one booster in autumn, Oxford vaccine boss says
BRITONS could receive a single booster jab in the autumn that protects against all mutant strains, it emerged last night.
The Health Secretary said yesterday that scientists and manufacturers were ‘doing all they can’ to adapt vaccines to work against the Brazilian and South African variants.
The head of the Oxford Vaccine Group added that similarities between the two strains mean just one dose of an updated jab could work against both.
Professor Andrew Pollard urged people not to panic and said it was time to ‘move away from obsessions with each variant’. It comes amid heightened fears that concerning mutations, which can evade antibodies, could derail plans to lift lockdown.
So far six cases of the Brazilian variant have been identified in the UK, including one individual who forgot to fill in their contact details on a form.
The hunt for the ‘missing’ sixth case yesterday narrowed to 379 households in the South East, after officials analysed postal data.
Health officials are going from doorfrom
‘Doing all we can to stop the spread’
to-door to track down the individual. Health Secretary Matt Hancock told the Commons: ‘We’ve identified the batch of home test kits in question. Our search has narrowed down to 379 households in the South East of England and we are contacting each one.’
Mr Hancock said that vaccine manufacturers were developing an updated jab that would fight the strains.
He said: ‘Our current vaccines have not yet been studied against this variant and we are working to find out what impact this might have.
‘But we do know this variant has caused significant challenges in Brazil.
‘So we are doing all we can to stop the spread in the UK to analyse its effects and to develop an updated vaccine that works on all these variants of concern and protect the progress that we’ve made as a nation.’
AstraZeneca, Pfizer and Moderna – the big three vaccine makers supplying the UK – have already committed to updating their jabs.
So far there have been 193 confirmed cases of the South African variant. The Kent variant, which emerged in September, is now dominant in the UK.
Professor Pollard told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: ‘The nature of this virus is that it will continue to throw out new mutations in time. So, to some extent, we’ve got to start moving away an obsession with each variant as it appears [and] try to rely on the excellent sequencing that is being run nationally to pick up variants so that new designs of vaccines can be made as and when they are needed.’
He said there were similarities between the South African and Brazilian strains – both share the E484K mutation – and a booster injection could work against both.
Professor Pollard said: ‘The work at the moment is partly to understand whether a vaccine for one of them might actually protect against both so there’s a lot more that we don’t know yet about this.’
Meanwhile, Professor Sharon Peacock, chairman of the Covid-19 Genomics UK scientific body, said the jab will have to be adapted so that it provides immunity against the Brazil variant.
She said: ‘What these variants will mean is that the vaccine manufacturers will be looking to make adaptations to the vaccine so that people can have boosters. Some of those adapted vaccines are already being tested in clinical studies.’
The emergence of the Brazilian variant in the UK has not altered plans to reopen schools on Monday. Officials are reassured by the low number of cases.
The rest of those infected by the strain, two people from a household in Gloucestershire and three others in the northeast of Scotland, are linked to travel.