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LONDON, June 14 (Reuters) - The Delta coronavirus variant
doubles the risk of hospitalisation compared with the previously
dominant variant in Britain, but two doses of vaccine still
provide strong protection, a Scottish study found on Monday.
The study said early evidence suggested the protection from
vaccines against the Delta variant, first identified in India,
might be lower than the effectivessness against the Alpha
variant, first identified in Kent, southeast England.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is expected to delay
the ending of COVID-19 restrictions in England on Monday,
following a rapid rise in cases of the Delta variant, which is
also more transmissible than the Alpha variant.
The study, published in a research letter in the Lancet,
looked at 19,543 community cases and 377 hospitalisations among
5.4 million people in Scotland, 7,723 cases and 1234
hospitalisations of which were found to have the Delta variant.
Chris Robertson, Professor of Public Health Epidemiology,
University of Strathclyde, said that adjusting for age and
comorbidities, the Delta variant roughly doubled the risk of
hospitalisation, but vaccines still reduced that risk.
"If you test positive, then two doses of the vaccine or one
dose for 28 days roughly reduces your risk of being admitted to
hospital by 70%," he told reporters.
Two weeks after the second dose, Pfizer BioNTech's
vaccine was found to have 79% protection against
infection from the Delta variant, compared to 92% against the
Alpha variant. For Oxford-AstraZeneca's vaccine, there
was 60% protection against Delta compared with 73% for Alpha.
The researchers cautioned against using the data to compare
the vaccines against each other due to differences in the
cohorts which received each type of shot, and differences in how
quickly immunity is developed with each shot.
They said two doses of vaccine provide much better
protection than one dose against the Delta variant, and a delay
to easing lockdown in England would help more people get second
doses and for their immune responses to build up.
"I think any sort of increase in the window of opportunity
before lockdown measures are completely brought to an end will
be helpful," said Aziz Sheikh, Director of the Usher Institute
at the University of Edinburgh.
(Reporting by Alistair Smout; Editing by Nick Macfie)
