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Wagamaga OP t1_iyx6zk5 wrote

The Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine limits transmission, hospitalization, and death from COVID-19 even among patients infected by variants of the virus, but the effectiveness of antibodies it generates diminishes as patients get older, according to a study by UT Southwestern researchers.

“The fact that these antibody functions decrease with age is one reason why the elderly are still more susceptible to severe illness with COVID-19 and highlights the need to develop different approaches for older, vulnerable individuals,” said Lenette Lu, M.D., Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Internal Medicine and Immunology in the Division of Infectious Diseases and Geographic Medicine, and lead author of the paper published in Cell Reports.

The vaccine, approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in August 2021, contains a piece of mRNA encoding the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein, which the virus uses to infect human cells. Initial studies of the vaccine focused on how it led to the generation of antibodies that could prevent SARS-CoV-2 from entering cells, neutralizing the virus before it could cause disease.

The emergence of new variants, including Delta and Omicron, left the vaccine less effective at neutralizing SARS-CoV-2 and resulted in increased rates of infection. However, vaccinated individuals, even when infected with COVID-19, continued to be protected against severe disease and death.

To understand how vaccines protect people without completely neutralizing the virus, blood samples were analyzed from 51 adults, ranging in age from 21 to 82, who had not been infected previously with COVID-19 and who each received two doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine between December 2020 and February 2021. From the samples, the researchers isolated antibodies specific to the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein.

The team showed that the antibodies generated in response to the vaccine were effective at neutralizing the original version of SARS-CoV-2 that emerged in 2019 but, as expected, were not as effective against the Delta and Omicron variants. In addition, the researchers found that these antibodies led to the activation of immune cells that can carry out a variety of antiviral effector functions after infection.

“In other words, even if an antibody is less able to prevent variants of a virus from infection, it can still block the development of symptoms, disease severity, and spread from one person to another,” said Dr. Lu.

These antibody activities and functions differed by age, with people under 65 carrying significantly more of the activities and functions compared to those over 65. Dr. Lu’s team discovered these observations could be attributed to different sugars attached to the antibodies. With age, these sugars change and antibody functions diminish.

The data suggests that boosters and updated vaccines are more important for older adults. In addition, as new variants of SARS-CoV-2 emerge, a better understanding of how to make vaccines that are effective at preventing disease in addition to infection is important.

“Beyond COVID-19, all viruses and bacteria that infect us change over time,” said Dr. Lu. “If we understand how antibodies protect us despite these changes, then we can enhance the durability of preventive clinical tools such as vaccines.”

https://www.newswise.com/coronavirus/covid-19-vaccine-s-effectiveness-diminishes-with-age-research-shows/?article_id=783185

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GenoPax t1_iyxjx67 wrote

So they don’t protect the only age group that their life depends on an effective vacccine?

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Moont1de t1_iyy758h wrote

Replying to poondox (#860,680)

> a substance used to stimulate the production of antibodies and provide immunity against one or several diseases, prepared from the causative agent of a disease, its products, or a synthetic substitute, treated to act as an antigen without inducing the disease.

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nexusgmail t1_iyyda8c wrote

Not knocking the gathering of information on display here, but I'm sure glad that other studies are starting to focus on aspects of the COVID-19 vaccine immune-response other than antibodies. We've become antibody-obsessed, when it's totally normal to not always have antibodies floating around in you.

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aradil t1_iyymhp4 wrote

Replying to nexusgmail (#860,996)

Isn’t it actually bad to constantly have your body constantly in a state of autoimmune response to things?

I’m pretty sure that causes disease itself.

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aradil t1_iyzpaxo wrote

Replying to Alastor3 (#861,915)

Well yes, but you don’t normally get vaccines often enough that you are chronically inflamed for years at at a time.

This also includes being exposed to viruses constantly that your body has to continually fight off - I wasn’t suggesting it was a vaccine thing specifically.

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Teacherofmice t1_iyzxhw9 wrote

I got my tetanus booster this year. I'm hoping that when I get tetanus in the next 6 months the booster will help it not be so serious.

Oh wait. I won't get tetanus now, because a vaccine prevents you from getting the disease in the first place (except in extremely rare circumstances).

Why are we still calling these Covid shots vaccines? They have never been vaccines. If all they do is reduce symptoms a bit then they are on the same level as vitamin C tablets.

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