Alliance for Pandemic Preparedness

February 10, 2021

Neutralization of SARS-CoV-2 Spike 69/70 Deletion, E484K and N501Y Variants by BNT162b2 Vaccine-Elicited Sera

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Human sera from 20 participants who received both doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine showed equivalent neutralization titers (with differences of four-fold or less) between wild type and variants strains of SARS-CoV-2 viruses that were engineered to contain spike proteins from recently emerged variants. The combinations of mutations included N501Y (present in variants emerging from the UK and South Africa), 69/70-deletion + N501Y + D614G (first described in the UK), and E484K + N501Y + D614G (first described in South Africa). Neutralization geometric mean titers (GMTs) against the three variant strains were 0.8- to 1.5-fold that of the GMTs against parental virus, suggesting small impacts of these mutations on neutralization by sera from vaccinated individuals. The authors note a limitation that the engineered viruses do not contain the full set of mutations present in the variants. [EDITORIAL NOTE: This manuscript was summarized previously as a pre-print on January 28.]

Xie et al. (Feb 8, 2021). Neutralization of SARS-CoV-2 Spike 69/70 Deletion, E484K and N501Y Variants by BNT162b2 Vaccine-Elicited Sera. Nature Medicine. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41591-021-01270-4