More evidence is emerging that the Oxford Covid vaccine works in older people, according to vaccine experts in the UK.
Sir Munir Pirmohamed, boss of the Commission on Human Medicines, today said regulators had received extra information from Oxford University and AstraZeneca scientists to prove their jab was safe and effective for over-65s.
The data, which is not yet publicly available, is coming now from same clinical trials in the UK and around the world that got it approved in the first place. They enrolled thousands more older people after the jab was green-lighted.
European leaders have ruffled the vaccine-maker’s feathers in recent weeks by claiming the vaccine doesn’t work on older people and refusing to use it.
In the same week that politicians were slinging mud at AstraZeneca for scaling back its deliveries, many European countries openly criticised the vaccine, with France’s President Macron calling it ‘quasi-ineffective’.
Oxford scientists hit back against the claims, with Professor Andrew Pollard saying he didn’t understand what Mr Macron’s comment meant. And the team behind the ground-breaking vaccine said the idea that it didn’t work had ‘no basis’.
Numerous countries including Spain, Germany, France, Hungary, Sweden and Norway have suggested they won’t give the jab to anyone over 65.
Scientists admit there is a lack of data definitively proving the vaccine works for elderly people but the data they do have suggests it doesn’t affect them any less than it does younger people, in whom it is proven to prevent Covid-19.
Oxford and AstraZeneca chiefs said this week that they expect data on effectiveness in over-65s – who were in the same study as other age groups but a couple of months behind – in the next few weeks.
It comes as another study published today by Oxford found that the vaccine works just as well against the fast-spreading Kent variant B.1.1.7 which is now dominant in the UK.
Oxford University and AstraZeneca’s vaccine has sparked criticism…
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