Studies suggest sharp drop in vaccine protection vs. omicron—yet cause for optimism
NPR, December 8, 2021
In South Africa researchers at the Africa Health Research Institute took blood from about a dozen people who had been vaccinated with two shots of the Pfizer vaccine and looked to see how well their antibodies kill the virus. In the experiment, everyone's antibodies were able to neutralize an earlier version of the virus quite well. And that's a lot. "It's astonishing ... in terms of the reduction," said Pei-Yong Shi, a virologist at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston who has been doing similar experiments to determine the effectiveness of the Pfizer vaccine against the coronavirus. This story was picked up by NPR affiliates across the country.