Spacing Pfizer COVID jabs boosts antibody levels: UK study

Oxford University study finds that a longer gap between doses of Pfizer vaccine leads to higher overall antibody levels.

A longer gap between doses of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine leads to higher overall antibody levels than a shorter gap, a UK study has found, but antibody levels are not sustained for long after the first dose. The University of Oxford-led study might help inform vaccination strategies against the Delta variant, which reduces the effectiveness of a first dose of the vaccine even though two doses are still protective, and one author said that the UK’s eight-week gap was a “sweet spot” against Delta. “What we found was, on average, if you had a shorter dosing interval, you had lower antibodies,” Susanna Dunachie, a professor of Infectious Diseases at the University of Oxford and joint chief investigator of the study told Al Jazeera.