South Africa released vital information stating that the J&J booster for the Covid-19 omicron variant has proved to be 85% effective.
The head of South Africa’s Medical Research Council (SAMRC) stated that they have tested that the Covid-19 vaccine booster from Johnson and Johnson is 85% effective against hospitalization and severe infection.
The head of SAMRC, Glenda Gray stated that this study has been conducted across South Africa by the health ministry while the country witnessed the fourth wave of coronavirus.
“We saw an 85% vaccine effectiveness and we saw that this kind of vaccine effectiveness is maintained for up to two months,” she said. “We are very happy to report very high levels of vaccine effectiveness against Omicron.”
According to the reports, the study was conducted on 477,234 workers from the healthcare department. They all were vaccinated from J&J Covid-19 shots, whereas, 236,000 were given J&J boosters.
It was proven that the hospitalization among the workers who were given the booster shots stayed away from the hospitals. The booster shots reduced the hospitalization to about 63% in the initial two weeks of booster shot and the protection went all the way to 85% after the first month.
“This is the world’s first evidence of vaccine effectiveness (against Omicron) using the J&J vaccine,” Gray said.
The participants of the study comprised around 30,000 infected from the omicron wave, whereas, about 11000 were the ones who had been effective in previous Covid-19 waves fueled by delta variant and beta stain.
The study also gave an insight that those who had HIV were far more vulnerable to being hospitalized as compared to the other healthier participants.
“They (those being hospitalized) are more likely to have HIV and less likely to have other comorbidities as compared to the Beta and Delta period, HIV prevalence in South Africa is about 13%,” Gray said.
This new revelation supports the already globally accepted evidence that protection can be achieved by booster doses and vaccine protection can minimize the infection possibility.
