The protection provided by COVID-19 vaccines declines after four to six months, a large United Kingdom study has found. Researchers from health science company ZOE, a spin-out from King’s College London, recently have found that a full course of the Pfizer vaccine was 88 percent effective at preventing infection after one month, and this protection fell to 74 percent after five to six months.
Tim Spector, a professor of genetic epidemiology who led the research, said that the data is broadly consistent with various other studies on COVID-19 vaccine efficacy over time, including a recent survey from Oxford University that found protection from the Pfizer and AstraZeneca jabs against the Delta variant weakened within three months.
However, Simon Clarke, an associate professor in microbiology at Reading University, who was not involved in the research, said the claim that protection may dip below 50 percent this year “is not based on any strong analysis of data” and seems “more like a finger in the air prediction”.
“Immunity is a complex process and we cannot assume people’s immunity will fade at a uniform rate over time,” Clarke said.
Peter English, a former chairman of the British Medical Association’s Public Health Medicine Committee, who was not involved in the research, said that the data is limited as it did not provide information about vaccine efficacy at preventing severe disease.
“There is a world of difference between efficacy against, on the one hand, any infection and on the other hand, illness severe enough to require hospitalization, critical care, or to cause death,” English said.
Spector said that, in light of the new research, “we urgently need to make plans for vaccine boosters”, or third shots aimed at combating fading immunity. He told the BBC that these shots should be reserved for certain groups, and that a widespread booster campaign would be a “huge waste” and “ethically dubious”.
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American College of Physicians 'stepped out of its lane" by placing gun control in medical education. Stanley Gold-farb, formerly the associate dean of curriculum at the University of Pennsylvania's Perelman School of Medicine, argued that teaching social justice issues and population health comes "at the expense of strict training in medical science" at a time when sub-specialists are in short supply. But many physicians, ourselves included, think social issues should be at the heart of medical education.
Formal medical school typically takes four years, followed by several years of residency（住院医生实习期）and often a fellowship（研究员职位）, and during that short time students have a wide range of competing requirements. They must learn complex biological and chemical pathways that explain diseases and health. They must be educated on how to read the the scientific literature and apply it to their patients. They must master many therapies and know how to adapt them to patients' varied diseases states. On top of all this, they must learn to communicate effectively and compassionately with patients and colleagues.
Being a good doctor also demands that we understand the reasons behind poor health. Our mission is not simply to diagnose, manage and treat. Physicians should act to prevent the root causes of illness and improve well-being. Physicians are trained to tackle problems at their root. System and structural-level social issues are also drivers of poor health, and it is our duty to address them. Medical training must evolve to produce doctors who are able to not only treat the individual but also understand the larger influencers of health -- of which gun violence is most emphatically one. As medical professors, we would fail our students -- and our patients - if we expected any less.
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