Study suggests vaccines effective against hospitalization from Delta variant

June 15, 2021

An analysis released by Public Health England found that several COVID-19 vaccines are effective against the Delta variant (B.1.617.2) of SARS-CoV-2.

Specifically, the study found the following:

·        the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine is 96% effective against hospitalization after 2 doses.

·         the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine is 92% effective against hospitalization after 2 doses.

Public Health England said the results were comparable to the effectiveness against hospitalization for the Alpha (B.1.1.7) variant.

“Further work remains underway to establish the level of protection against mortality from the Delta variant. However, as with other variants, this is expected to be high,” Public Health England said.

The analysis included 14,019 patient cases of the Delta variant in England, including 166 of whom were hospitalized, between April 12 and June 4.

Public Health England (PHE) has previously published an analysis showing that one dose is 17% less effective at preventing symptomatic illness from the Delta variant, compared to Alpha, but there is only a small difference after 2 doses.

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