JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israel’s largest health care provider reported a 94% drop in symptomatic COVID-19 infections on Sunday among 600,000 people who received two doses of the Pfizer vaccine in the country’s largest study to date.
The health maintenance organization (HMO) Clalit, which covers more than half of all Israelis, said the same group was also 92% less likely to develop serious illnesses caused by the virus.
The comparison was against a group of the same size, with a compatible medical history, who had not received the vaccine.
“This shows unequivocally that the Pfizer coronavirus vaccine is extremely effective in the real world a week after the second dose, just as it was discovered in the clinical study,” said Ran Balicer, director of innovation at Clalit.
He added that the data indicate that the Pfizer vaccine, developed in partnership with Germany’s BioNTech, is even more effective two weeks or more after the second injection.
Researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science, who tabulate national data, said on Sunday that a sharp decline in hospitalization and serious illnesses previously identified among the first age group to be vaccinated – 60 years or older – was seen for the first time in those aged 55 and over. years or more.
Hospitalizations and serious illnesses were still increasing in younger groups who started vaccination weeks later.
Israel has been conducting a rapid vaccine launch and its database offers insights into the vaccine’s effectiveness and the extent to which countries can achieve collective immunity.
Reporting by Ari Rabinovitch and Maayan Lubell; Editing by David Goodman