Pfizer, Moderna and Sputnik V vaccine induce better than natural immunity from mild COVID

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In a new study from Skoltech, researchers examined the effect of coronavirus immunization with three popular vaccines: Moderna, Pfizer, and the Russian Sputnik V.

They found that complete vaccination—that is, getting both shots—on average resulted in a similar and sufficiently high immune response regardless of which of the three vaccines was used.

The effect was also comparable to that after recovering from a severe or moderate, but not mild, COVID-19 infection.

All three vaccines induce the production of antibodies of a similar kind.

Namely, those targeting what’s known as the receptor-binding domain of the viral spike protein—the familiar outgrowth on the surface of the coronavirus particle through which it initially interacts with the host cell.

The team found the overall distribution was comparable for those with two shots of Sputnik V, Moderna, or Pfizer; or a history of moderate to severe COVID-19.

The team also assessed the immunity of those having received just one shot of Sputnik V—the injection later adopted in Russia as the single-component Sputnik Light vaccine.

The researchers treated COVID-19 patients who had had a mild case or no symptoms as a distinct group, finding their immune response to be markedly lower than that of the double-vaccinated persons or those having recovered from at least a moderately severe infection.

Besides that, the study looked at how the level of antibodies varied with time after vaccination with Sputnik V. The main observation was that no universal trend emerged.

Depending on the patient, the level of antibodies can diminish slowly or sharply, fluctuate, hold steady, or even continue growing for some time.

In one case, the vaccination even had no effect on the moderate, yet apparently sufficient antibody count of the patient.

It seems that patients receiving Sputnik V tend to retain a decent immunity for as long as 10 months or more.

The researchers hypothesize that this long-lasting effect might be a feature of adenovirus-based vaccines since it was also observed for AstraZeneca, which belongs to the same class.

If you care about vaccines, please read studies about Moderna COVID vaccine highly effective against all variants, and COVID-19 infection, more likely than vaccines, to cause heart inflammation.

For more information about Covid, please see recent studies that Omicron lasts much longer on surfaces than other variants, and results showing that three doses of Moderna vaccine effectively prevent severe omicron infection.

The study is published in on medRxiv and was conducted by Maria Tutukina et al.

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