By Maria Carolina Marcello
BRASILIA (Reuters) – A variant of the coronavirus identified in the Brazilian Amazon may be three times more contagious, but initial analyzes suggest that vaccines are still effective against it, the country’s health minister said on Thursday, without providing evidence for the allegations.
Under pressure while the variant hammers the city of Manaus in the jungle with a devastating second wave of infections, Health Minister Eduardo Pazuello has sought to reassure lawmakers that the wave of the past few months has been unexpected, but is under control.
He also said in a Senate hearing that Brazil would vaccinate half of its eligible population by June and the rest by the end of the year – an ambitious target, as the country has barely guaranteed doses for half the population.
Brazil started immunizing with vaccines made by Chinese Sinovac Biotech and British AstraZeneca about three weeks ago. Pazuello did not explain how its effectiveness against the Manaus variant was analyzed.
“Thank God, we had clear news from the analysis that vaccines still have an effect against this variant,” said Pazuello. “But it is more contagious. From our analysis, it is three times more contagious.”
The Ministry of Health, which did not provide information on such analyzes, did not immediately respond to a request for more information.
The Butantan Institute in São Paulo, which partnered with Sinovac to test and produce the Chinese vaccine, said in a statement that it had already started studies on the Manaus variant, but that it would take two weeks to complete.
Fiocruz’s biomedical center in Rio de Janeiro, which has partnered with AstraZeneca to pack and finalize the doses of its vaccine developed with the University of Oxford, said it is studying its effectiveness against the Amazon variant, sent samples to Oxford and awaits the results .
(Reporting by Maria Carolina Marcello; Additional reporting by Jake Spring; Editing by Brad Haynes and Sam Holmes)