Large real world study confirms Pfizer vaccine 94% effective

TEL AVIV (AFP) – The Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine has proven 94 percent effective in a study involving 1.2 million people in Israel, the first peer-reviewed real world research confirming the power of mass immunization campaigns to bring the pandemic to a close.

The paper, which was published in the New England Journal of Medicine on Wednesday, also demonstrated there is likely a strong protective benefit against infection, a crucial element in breaking onward transmission.

“The fact that the vaccines worked so well in the real world... really does suggest that if the nations of the world can find the will, we now have the means to end COVID-19 forever,” said Ben Neuman, a virologist from Texas A&M University who was not involved in the research.

The experiment was carried out between Dec. 20 2020 and Feb. 1, 2021 – a period when a newer variant first identified in Britain was rampant in Israel, making the vaccine’s performance all the more impressive.

The efficacy against symptomatic infections was 57 percent between 14 to 20 days after the first dose, but rose to 94 percent seven days after the second dose – very close to the 95 percent achieved during Phase 3 clinical trials.

People who received second doses were also protected against death and hospitalization – though the precise numbers here are less significant and had a wider statistical range because of the relatively lower number of cases.