Sinovac up to 91% effective against Alpha variant: Public Health Ministry
Tests on people 14 days after they took their second jab of Sinovac vaccine show that they are 71 to 91 per cent protected against the Alpha variant, the Public Health Ministry announced on Monday.
Dr Kiattiphum Wongrachit, the ministry’s permanent secretary, said the study was conducted between April and June on people in different provinces.
The study showed that Sinovac provided 90.7 per cent protection for jab recipients in Phuket, 90.5 per cent in Samut Sakhon, 82.8 per cent for medical personnel in Chiang Rai and 70.9 per cent for medics at the Department of Disease Control.
“Nobody who has taken the Sinovac jab has died from Covid-19 so far,” he added.
Kiattiphum went on to say that the vaccine has been proven to provide 94 per cent protection against symptomatic illness for people in Indonesia, 89 per cent in Chile and 80 per cent in Brazil. The vaccine was also found to provide 98 per cent protection from death for Covid-19 patients in Indonesia and 95 per cent in Brazil.
“These studies prove the vaccine’s efficacy in protecting people from getting infected or dying due to Covid-19,” he said.
Dr Suppakit Sirilak, director-general of the Department of Medical Sciences, said the ministry will launch a new study in July to check out both AstraZeneca and Sinovac vaccines’ efficacy against the Delta variant.
