May 26, 2021

Influence of Past Infection with SARS-CoV-2 on the Response to the BioTech Pfizer BNT162b2 MRNA Vaccine in Health Care Workers Kinetics and Durability of the Humoral Response

Category: Article Summary

Topic: Vaccines and Immunity

Keywords (Tags): antibodies, immunity, vaccine

• [Pre-print, not peer-reviewed] A cohort study of 63 hospital healthcare workers in Spain who received 2 doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine found that those with a previous SARS-CoV-2 infection developed a 126-fold increase in antibody levels after 1 dose and maintained higher antibody levels than SARS-CoV-2 naïve workers after the 2nd dose. Healthcare workers with history of SARS-CoV-2 infection did not experience an increase in antibodies after the second dose, while SARS-CoV-2 naïve workers had a significant increase in antibody levels. The authors suggest these results may indicate the persistence of strong immunologic memory in persons with past SARS-CoV-2 infection and that vaccination of these persons could potentially be postponed as a strategy to optimize vaccine allocation.

Ontanon et al. (May 26, 2021). Influence of Past Infection with SARS-CoV-2 on the Response to the BioTech Pfizer BNT162b2 MRNA Vaccine in Health Care Workers Kinetics and Durability of the Humoral Response. Pre-print downloaded May 26 from https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.05.25.21257788