MAINTAINING a strong immune system is crucial for individuals aged over 40 to protect against chronic health conditions such as diabetes, heart disease and cancer.
IPOH: A serology or antibody test may not be accurate enough to determine whether or not someone is fully vaccinated.
Malaysian Society of Allergy and Immunology president Prof Dr Baharudin Abdullah said it is still unclear whether or not such tests have any value in determining a person s immunity status post-vaccination. According to the US Food and Drug Administration, the Covid-19 vaccine induces antibodies differently from a natural infection. An individual infected with Covid-19 may be tested positive by the antibody test but the antibodies from a vaccinated person may not be detectable, he said when contacted on Sunday (July 25).
This came about following reports that pharmaceutical companies like Pfizer are making plans for such jabs.
Universiti Malaya epidemiologist Prof Datuk Dr Awang Bulgiba Awang Mahmud said local data must be collected to determine how long the Covid-19 vaccines were effective for.
“The rapid evolution of the virus in this pandemic means vaccines need to remain effective against newer variants.
“Booster doses will depend on which vaccines have been administered to vaccine recipients.
“Not all vaccines are equally effective and we need local data for this, ” he said.
Dr Awang Bulgiba, who is the head of the Independent Covid-19 Vaccination Advisory Committee, said it had recommended a voluntary Covid-19 vaccination registry to be set up to compile such data.
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PETALING JAYA: Reducing the dosing interval for AstraZeneca vaccines is needed to protect Malaysians better, health experts say, especially with variants posing a risk to the country’s mass vaccination programme.
Universiti Malaya epidemiologist Prof Datuk Dr Awang Bulgiba Awang Mahmud said shortening the dose interval may be needed due to the global prevalence of the Delta variant which threatens to undermine the countries’ road to recovery.
“At first, enabling maximum coverage of the population was used as a rationale for longer dose intervals in the UK to get the maximum number of people with at least some protection afforded by a single dose.