Covishield and Covaxin are effective in preventing disease severity and mortality against the Delta variant in fully vaccinated hospitalised patients, according to a joint study undertaken by scientists of CSIR-Centre for Cellular & Molecular Biology (CCMB) and doctors at AIG Hospitals on Sunday.
Clinical outcomes in vaccinated individuals hospitalised with Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2 study has been published in ‘MedRxiv - The preprint server for health sciences’ and stated that the emerging variants of SARS-CoV-2 with increased transmissibility or immune escape have been causing large outbreaks of COVID infections across the world.
As most vaccines currently in use have been derived from viral strains circulating in the early part of the pandemic, it became imperative to constantly assess the efficacy of the vaccines against emerging variants. In this hospital-based cohort study, clinical profiles and outcomes of 1,161 hospitalised patients vaccinated with Covishield, 495 vaccinated with Covaxin and 666 unvaccinated persons here between April 24 and May 31 were investigated.
Viral genome sequencing revealed that >90% of patients in both groups were harbouring Delta variant and vaccinated individuals showed higher neutralising antibodies when compared to the unvaccinated group. Severity of the disease and requirement of ventilatory support were significantly low in the vaccinated group despite the fact that those individuals had significantly higher age and risk factors.
The mortality rate was about 50% lower in the completely vaccinated breakthrough infections although mortality in individuals who had received a single dose was similar to the unvaccinated group. CCMB scientists’ group had Jagadeesh Kumar V, Divya Tej Sowpati, Apoorva Munigela, Sofia Banu, Archana Bharadwaj Siva, Mitnala Sasikala, Chandrasekhar Nutalapati, Anand Kulkarni, Payel Mukherjee, Lamuk Zaveri while the AIG Hospitals team had Karthik Bharadwaj Tallapaka and Nageshwar Reddy D.
