The queue for KoviVac and the fight for immunity: how the vaccine is chosen

Last week, the St. Petersburg HEALTH Committee announced the delivery of 8580 sets of doses of the KoviVac vaccine to the city. At the same time, about 18 thousand Petersburgers are on the waiting list for vaccination with this drug. “At the moment, it is not possible to meet the demand for a vaccine in excess of the number of doses received,” the information note from the Interagency Council on Combating covid-19 says .

However, judging by the discussions on social networks, some citizens are ready to wait for KoviVac until it appears, and refuse to be vaccinated with other drugs. RBC Petersburg asked doctors why Petersburgers are attracted to the vaccine developed by the center. Chumakov, and how reasonable their argument is.

"There's a live virus"

“I didn’t wait for KoviVak, I got sick. God forbid I get out and get grafted anyway with KoviVacom,” a user writes in the “Committee for Health of St. Petersburg” group on the VKontakte social network. Under the post about the long-awaited delivery of KoviVac to the city, there are dozens of other comments from those who want to be vaccinated with this drug - some have been waiting for their turn to be vaccinated since the beginning of summer, and the new batch of vaccines did not advance them in the queue. By calling 122, citizens are informed that it is not yet possible to sign up for the KoviVacom vaccination. “And why is Sputnik not good?” the user is interested. “Well, probably because there is a live virus,” another responds. Many explain the desire to get vaccinated with KoviVakom by the recommendations of the attending physician, fear of side effects from other vaccines, and a reference to a “proven method for producing the drug.”

Complete immunity

According to Nadezhda Satosova, an epidemiologist at the 21st Century Medical Center, the main argument of patients who choose CoviVac is that it is produced by one of the first ways to produce vaccines, which means that, according to people, it is safer and more effective. . “The vaccine consists of a whole virus, which is completely neutralized. There is such a thing in medicine as a more complete immunity - a full-fledged composition of antigens that a bacterium or a virus has. Accordingly, "KoviVac" has a complete composition of antigens and causes more complete immunity. Sputnik and EpiVacCorona do not contain all antigens; after their introduction, immunity appears against literally several CORONAVIRUS proteins, ”explains the expert.

According to Satosova, people without medical education get the impression that since KoviVac contains all the antigens, and other vaccines work only against a few proteins, then this particular drug is more reliable. “But this is a delusion, it has already been proven that the use of vector vaccines, such as Sputnik, is also effective,” says Satosova. As for safety, the epidemiologist notes that all drugs after the second stage of clinical trials have proven their safety, "otherwise they would simply not have been released into civilian circulation."