Covid-19 vaccines have brought down the rate of coronavirus transmission and hospitalisation cases, according to two separate studies conducted by researchers in England and Scotland.
The examination by Public Health England revealed that the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine reduces the risk of contracting coronavirus by over 70 per cent after the administration of the first dose. The risk gets further reduced by 85 per cent after the second dose.
Their analysis further stated that vaccinated people, if infected with coronavirus, were highly unlikely to die or develop the more severe symptoms of the virus.
“This crucial report shows vaccines are working — it is extremely encouraging to see evidence that the Pfizer vaccine offers a high degree of protection against coronavirus,” Health Secretary Matt Hancock said, as cited in the media reports.
Study by Scotland researchers
Another study by the Scottish researchers revealed that the Pfizer-BioNTech and Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccinations reduced Covid-19 hospitalisation significantly.
The study, conducted by the University of Edinburgh, noted that the vaccines are able to reduce the risk of hospitalisation by up to 85 per cent after a month post-inoculation.
The researchers said that the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine reduced the risk by 94 per cent.
“These results are very encouraging and have given us great reasons to be optimistic for the future,” Professor Aziz Sheikh, who led the research, said in an official statement, cited in media reports.
“We now have national evidence — across an entire country — that vaccination provides protection against Covid-19 hospitalisations. Roll-out of the first vaccine dose now needs to be accelerated globally to help overcome this terrible disease,” he added.
For the study, the researchers compared the outcomes of Covid-19 for non-vaccinated and vaccinated people.