Johnson & Johnson has said that its single-dose Covid-19 vaccine generated strong and persistent activity against the rapidly spreading Delta variant and other highly prevalent SARS-CoV-2 variants.

New studies

Citing data from two new studies, the US-based company added that the durability of the immune response was also seen to last through at least eight months, the length of time evaluated to date.

“We believe that our vaccine offers durable protection against Covid-19 and elicits neutralising activity against the Delta variant. This adds to the robust body of clinical data supporting our single-shot vaccine’s ability to protect against multiple variants of concern,” said Paul Stoffels, Vice Chairman of the Executive Committee and Chief Scientific Officer at J&J.

“Current data for the eight months studied so far show that the single-shot Johnson & Johnson vaccine generates a strong neutralising antibody response that does not wane; rather, we observe an improvement over time. In addition, we observe a persistent and particularly robust, durable cellular immune response,” added Mathai Mammen, Global Head, Janssen Research & Development at J&J. J&J has a production alliance in India with Biological E, and is one of the vaccines in India’s armament against Covid-19.

Giving details from study, the company said its vaccine elicited neutralising antibody activity against the Delta variant at an even higher level than what was recently observed for the Beta (B.1.351) variant in South Africa, where high efficacy against severe/critical disease was demonstrated.

In the ENSEMBLE trial, Johnson & Johnson’s single-dose vaccine was 85 per cent effective against severe/critical disease and demonstrated protection against hospitalisation and death. The vaccine was consistently effective across all regions studied globally, including in South Africa and Brazil, where there was a high prevalence of rapidly emerging Beta and Zeta (P.2) variants during the study period.

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