The vaccination campaign has begun. Watch:
(Photo: Nitzan Dror, Ido Erez, spokeswoman for Beilinson Hospital, Gilad Shaabani Chopin, Kaplan Medical Center )
So what exactly is the difference between the two vaccines, which of them may be more suitable for you and is it worth waiting for the modern vaccine or the next vaccines in line?
First, the only vaccine currently offered in Israel is that of Pfizer. Moderna’s vaccine is expected to arrive only in March 2021, so by that time, the vaccine you will be receiving will only be Pfizer’s.
After March-April, when there will be two vaccines in the country – maybe you can choose between the two, it already depends on the fund procedures to which you belong. And even if you do not, at least you will know what vaccine you received. Not that the nurse will tell you, but you will know it according to the date of the second dose set for you – with the Pfizer vaccine you will receive it after 21 days, in modernity – after 28 days.
In terms of vaccine efficacy – the results are almost identical (94.1% for modernity, 95% for pfizer). In addition, the modern vaccine should not be stored in a freezer at minus 70 degrees, like the Pfizer vaccine, but at a temperature of minus 20 degrees. This of course makes the storage and transport of a modern vaccine much easier, but for the vaccinator himself – this difference is not relevant.
Another difference is the age of onset of immunization. In Pfizer’s people aged 16 and over will be able to be vaccinated, with the modern vaccine they will only be vaccinated from the age of 18. Read here about the other differences between the vaccines:
Vaccine name: BNT162b2
Where is the production carried out? The vaccines for Israel are manufactured at BioNTech’s plants in Germany and Belgium.
How to store? The vaccine is given by injection into the muscle twice, 21 days apart.
How many participated in the Phase 3 trial? 43,448 subjects ranged in age from 16 to 71, with approximately 46% suffering from background diseases including heart disease, hypertension, HIV carriers, AIDS patients and liver patients.
What are the side effects found? Most of the subjects suffered from common side effects after vaccinations that passed within a few hours including fever, muscle aches, weakness, fatigue, local redness and swelling at the injection site.
Two vaccinated in the UK and another in Alaska, suffered a moderate allergic reaction that required hospitalization, at least two of the three had a history of severe allergic attacks. They all recovered within a few hours. During the study, six deaths were reported, four in the placebo group that received a sham vaccine (placebo), and two in the vaccine group that died of a heart attack, the test showed that there was no link between the vaccine and the deaths.
We compared the vaccines. Pfizer vs. Modern
(Photo: Reuters, AFP)
Vaccine name: mRNA-1273
Company: Moderna is an American pharmaceutical and biotechnology company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It was established in 2010 and has since begun developing vaccines based on mRNA (RNA messenger). The company’s medical director is the Israeli physician, Prof. Tal Zacks, a specialist in internal medicine and oncology.
Immunization technology: The vaccine base of modernity is the mRNA molecule injected into a muscle and commands the body to produce a corona shell-like protein. Just like in Pfizer’s vaccine, the immune system “mistakenly thinks” that it is a seemingly real virus that has entered the body, creating antibodies and T cells against the protein. The mRNA molecule is destroyed in a short time, does not penetrate the cell nucleus and does not change anything in existing cells.
Where production takes place: The vaccines for Israel are manufactured in the plants of a modern company in Switzerland.
How to store? The vaccine is given by injection into the muscle twice, 28 days apart.
How to preserve? The vaccines are kept at a temperature of minus 20 degrees. The vaccines can be stored in regular vaccine refrigerators at a temperature of 2 to 8 degrees Celsius, for a month. The vaccines survive at room temperature for only a few hours.
What are the side effects found? Most of the subjects suffered from common side effects after vaccinations that passed within a few hours including fever, muscle aches, weakness, fatigue, local redness and swelling at the injection site.
Who should not be vaccinated? At this stage, young people up to the age of 18, pregnant women and lactating women will not be able to get vaccinated, because there is not yet enough data about them.
The two vaccines, both Pfizer and Modern, are very similar and even almost identical in their safety and efficacy (the difference between 95% efficacy in Pfizer and 94.1% in modern is negligible and medically insignificant). Pfizer has a slight disadvantage in transporting vaccines, which require extreme temperature and survive only 5 days in standard vaccine refrigerators, while the modern vaccine allows storage for a month in normal cases, after storage of minus 20 degrees. However, this difficulty was also overcome in the world, and preparations were made for the proper transport of the vaccines.
And despite the resemblance, the fruits of modernity’s golden egg, the first to “surpass” the mRNA patent, we will soon begin to see: the company is about to come out with a host of additional vaccines, against extremely serious viral diseases.