Updated COVID boosters did not outperform original COVID vaccines – study
Wachiwit

Weeks after the U.S. rolled out updated COVID boosters, a newly-released study has indicated that the antibody response from the newly designed mRNA-based COVID-19 boosters was not superior to that generated from the original monovalent vaccines.
The results are likely to raise concerns over the efficacy of retooled mRNA-based vaccines from Pfizer (NYSE:PFE)/BioNTech (NASDAQ:BNTX) and Moderna (NASDAQ:MRNA) adjusted for Omicron BA.4 and BA.5 subvariants at a time their uptake remains weak.
The results that are yet to undergo peer review were based on a lab-based study that compared those who received the updated COVID boosters 3 â 5 weeks ago with the recipients of three or four doses of the original monovalent mRNA vaccines.
âWhen given as a fourth dose, a bivalent mRNA vaccine targeting Omicron BA.4/BA.5 and an ancestral SARS-CoV-2 strain did not induce superior neutralizing antibody responses in humans, at the time period tested, compared to the original monovalent vaccine formulation,â the researchers wrote.
One of the authors of the study, Aubree Gordon, serves on a scientific advisory board for Janssen unit of Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), which markets an unadjusted COVID-19 vaccine in the U.S.
Read: President Biden has just received his updated booster shot after a three month gap from his COVID infection in July.