By: Team NewsdayExpress | Posted: 21 Sep, 2021
London. According to studies presented at the annual conference of the European Society for Medical Oncology, vaccination against COVID-19 is effective in cancer patients whose immune systems are weakened by various anticancer drugs. The findings showed that individuals with cancer have an appropriate, protective immune response to vaccination without experiencing any more side effects than the general population. Indirect evidence also suggests that a third booster shot may further increase the level of protection among this patient population.
A study called VOICE showed that cancer patients who took the covid jab were protected regardless of current oncology treatment.
The study enrolled 791 patients from several hospitals in the Netherlands into four different study groups, including individuals without cancer, patients with cancer treated with immunotherapy, patients treated with chemotherapy, and finally a chemo- Patients treated with the immunotherapy combination were included in the dose mRNA-1273 vaccine to measure their responses to Moderna’s two.
These results compare favorably with the antibody responses seen in almost all (99.6 percent) of the group of individuals without cancer, according to Dr Antonio Passaro, a lung cancer specialist at the European Institute of Oncology in Milan, Italy, who studied are not included.
The high rate of vaccine efficacy seen in the trial population, regardless of the type of anticancer treatment, is a strong and reassuring message for patients and their doctors, he said.
Similar results were found in another study in Israel on the effects of tozzinamarin (Pfizer-BioNtech) among 232 cancer patients and 261 control subjects. Less than a third (29 percent) of those with cancer developed antibodies after receiving the first dose, compared with 84 percent in the control group, with this proportion increasing to 86 percent after the administration of the second dose.
Both the above studies also emphasized the need for cancer patients to get a second shot of COVID Vax in order to develop sufficient protective antibodies against the virus.
A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine showed that a booster shot on people age 60 or older, five months after completing their vaccination cycle, reduced the incidence of COVID-19 and severe illness. .
Dr Luis Castello said these findings lend additional support to the theory of offering cancer patients a full cycle, potentially including a third booster dose, to improve their safety, as it suggests that their immune systems can use additional stimulation. Will answer Branko, medical oncologist, ESMO Scientific and Medical Division, who was not part of the study. (IANS)
#What did you see: this new style of Divyanka Tripathi
.