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Russian Covid-19 Vaccine Was Highly Effective in Trial, Study Finds, Boosting Moscow’s Rollout Ambitions

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MOSCOW—Russia’s homegrown Sputnik V vaccine showed high levels of efficacy and safety in a peer-reviewed study released Tuesday, a potential boost for the Kremlin’s aim to promote the Covid-19 shot abroad and curb the pandemic at home.

The findings, from a preliminary analysis of a large-scale clinical trial published in the British medical journal the Lancet, demonstrated that the two-shot vaccine was 91.6% effective against symptomatic Covid-19 and offered complete protection against severe cases. There were no serious side effects, the paper said. The vaccine was also found to be similarly safe and effective in elderly people.

The study could be a significant milestone for Moscow in the global vaccination race, potentially offering President

Vladimir Putin’s

government geopolitical clout in the developing world and the chance to tap into the lucrative global vaccine market. Russia—the world’s fourth worst-hit country with nearly four million cases—has also banked on Sputnik V to avoid new costly lockdowns as authorities plan to vaccinate 60% of the domestic population by the end of the year.

The shot, which was approved by Russian authorities in August before undergoing large-scale clinical trials, has stirred questions in light of its fast-tracked development and lack of published trial data. So far, Sputnik V has been administered to more than two million people world-wide, including in Argentina, Serbia and Algeria, according to Russian authorities.

The Sputnik V Vaccine

Type: Two-dose viral vector vaccine

Efficacy: 91.6% (91.8% among people older than 60 years)

Price: Less than $10 a shot

Storage and transportation temperature: 36º-46ºF

Approved for use in: Russia, Belarus, Serbia, Argentina, Bolivia, Algeria, Palestine, Venezuela, Paraguay, Turkmenistan, Hungary, UAE, Iran, Guinea, Tunisia and Armenia

Administered in: Russia, Argentina, Bolivia, Belarus, Serbia, Algeria, Kazakhstan

Sources: The Lancet, Russian Direct Investment Fund

Tuesday’s results could help clear doubts surrounding the Russian shot.

“The development of the Sputnik V vaccine has been criticized for unseemly haste, corner cutting, and an absence of transparency,” virology professors Ian Jones at the U.K.’s University of Reading and Polly Roy at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine wrote in the Lancet. “But the outcome reported here is clear and the scientific principle of vaccination demonstrated, which means another vaccine can now join the fight to reduce the incidence of Covid-19.”

Alexander Gintsburg,

the head of the vaccine’s developer, the Moscow-based Gamaleya Institute, said that the data demonstrates Sputnik V’s safety and high efficacy against the virus.

This “is a great success in the global battle against the Covid-19 pandemic,” he said.

Sputnik V’s efficacy rate compares to vaccines developed by

Moderna Inc.

and

Pfizer Inc.

and its German partner

BioNTech SE,

which are around 95% effective.

The Lancet study didn’t address the shot’s usefulness against new variants of the virus, amid some early evidence suggesting strains may prove resistant to current vaccines. Russian officials said on Tuesday that they are continuously testing Sputnik V against new variants and they expect the shot to achieve the same level of efficacy. They also expect it to provide long-term immunity of as long as two years, based on early experimental evidence.

The results published on Tuesday were based on an interim analysis of a Phase 3 trial of nearly 20,000 participants, three-quarters of whom received the vaccine while the rest received a placebo. The analysis was based on a total of 78 confirmed Covid-19 cases, 62 of which were identified in the placebo group and 16 in the vaccine group. The clinical trial, totaling 40,000 volunteers, is ongoing.

Researchers found that the Covid-19 vaccine didn’t produce serious adverse reactions, the Lancet paper said. Most side effects included flulike symptoms, pain at the injection site and headaches.

Among the elderly, the vaccine was well tolerated and demonstrated an efficacy of 91.8%, based on a group of 2,144 volunteers older than 60, the paper said.

Like other Covid-19 vaccines, including ones developed by

Johnson & Johnson

and

AstraZeneca

PLC and Oxford University, Sputnik V uses a so-called viral vector approach. It introduces a genetically altered form of a harmless virus, known as the adenovirus, to serve as a vehicle—or vector—for a fragment of genetic material from the coronavirus.

As wealthier countries buy up supplies of Western drugmakers’ Covid-19 vaccines that are still in development, China and Russia are offering their fast-tracked shots to poorer nations. Here’s what they’re hoping to get in return. Illustration: Ksenia Shaikhutdinova

Each of the vaccine’s two shots is based on a different adenovirus vector, which Russian scientists say achieves a stronger immune response. Sputnik V has simpler logistics requirements compared with some of its peers, with a storage and transportation temperature of between 36 and 46 degrees Fahrenheit. The Pfizer vaccine must be kept at minus 94 degrees Fahrenheit before thawing.

With Sputnik V—a reference to the satellite the Soviet Union launched into orbit ahead of the U.S. in the Cold War space race—Russia could gain clout with some countries, analysts say, as well as participate in a global coronavirus vaccine market estimated by Russian officials at $100 billion annually.

Competing on price, Russia is selling the vaccine at less than $10 a dose, lower than Pfizer and Moderna, and is targeting up to 30% market share among Covid-19 shots in the countries buying Sputnik, according to Russian officials.

AstraZeneca has said that it would test whether a combination of its Covid-19 vaccine, which has shown to be between 62% and 90% effective depending on dosage, and Sputnik V can boost efficacy. Clinical trials for a combined shot are expected to start soon in Azerbaijan, the United Arab Emirates and other countries.

Some 15 countries outside Russia have already authorized Sputnik V, and Moscow has received orders or expressions of interest for 2.4 billion doses, including from Brazil, Mexico and India. In a bid to accelerate the global rollout, Russia will also offer a one-dose vaccine, dubbed Sputnik Light, which Russian authorities say would be between 73% and 85% effective.

To produce its vaccine, Russia relies on a global supply chain, including manufacturing hubs in Brazil, South Korea, India and China. Russia has also mounted an aggressive public-relations campaign abroad, including posting weekly video updates in English and maintaining a Twitter account for Sputnik V.

Sputnik V hasn’t been approved by Western health authorities or received authorization from the World Health Organization, which many developing countries rely on for vetting vaccines. Russia is in talks with the European Medicines Agency about approving the shot in the European Union and has applied for WHO authorization.

In Iran, health-care professionals and lawmakers criticized the government’s announcement that it would import Sputnik V, saying that the vaccine had not been approved by international bodies and that the purchase was politically motivated. Government officials said on Tuesday that Tehran would buy up to 1.5 million doses, with the first batch arriving as early as Saturday.

The domestic rollout has also faced challenges, including production delays and a skeptical populace.

Authorities have recently said that manufacturing is now being ramped up following initial equipment problems. They now expect to produce 11 million doses this month, up from seven million in January.

Around 46% of Russians said they would get a vaccine in a January survey by British polling firm Ipsos MORI, up 5 percentage points compared with December. Still, Russians were among the most reluctant to get inoculated globally, compared with 55% in France, 63% in the U.S. and 86% in the U.K.

Russia doesn’t publish daily vaccination rates, but regional data shows that at least 1.3 million Russians have received a dose so far.

Irina Levashova, a kindergarten teacher in Romodanovo, a small town some 400 miles southeast of Moscow, received her second shot last month along with her husband.

“I have many acquaintances who have been ill or even died from this disease, so I wanted to protect myself and my family,” Ms. Levashova, 58, said, adding that she didn’t experience any major side effects. “As soon as they started talking about vaccinations, I immediately told myself that me and my family would do it.”

—Valentina Ochirova contributed to this article

Write to Georgi Kantchev at georgi.kantchev@wsj.com

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Health

Israel’s Leaders Clash with Ultraorthodox Over Covid-19 Lockdowns, Vaccines

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BNEI BRAK, Israel—Israel’s attempt to suppress a roiling pandemic has collided with a hard-hit ultraorthodox community that has proven resistant to lockdowns and suspicious of the nation’s mass vaccination campaign.

On Sunday, thousands of ultraorthodox mourners attended two funerals of famous rabbis who died from the coronavirus. The mourners flouted bans on public gatherings of no more than 10 people on the same day that Israel’s cabinet extended a strict lockdown that includes barring all international flights. Thousands of men dressed in black wool hats and suits crowded together, many without masks, images of the event show. Fearing violence, police steered away from arrests while some top Israeli politicians seethed.

“This is how unequal enforcement looks,” said

Benny Gantz,

the defense minister and head of the Blue and White party. “Millions of families and children are locked in their homes and abide by the rules while thousands of haredim crowd the funeral, most of them even without masks,” he said, using the Hebrew word for ultraorthodox.

The funerals followed anti-lockdown protests in Bnei Brak and other ultraorthodox cities the week before, in which ultraorthodox men threw rocks at police, lit dumpsters on fire and knocked down street signs and light poles.

Many of the mourners crowding together for a rabbi’s funeral on Sunday in Jerusalem weren’t wearing face masks.



Photo:

Ariel Schalit/Associated Press

Israel’s health officials have also struggled to coax ultraorthodox to take a Covid-19 vaccine. While much of Israel has lined up for vaccinations, the ultraorthodox population has been slower to get on board, with some doubting the safety of the vaccine and others suggesting the country’s citizens are being used to test its efficacy.

“This isn’t a vaccine. It’s an experiment,” said

Izhar Mahpud,

a 57-year-old resident from Bnei Brak, an ultraorthodox city just east of Tel Aviv that has been one of the hardest hit by Covid-19 in the country. “I’m not ready to be a rat in a laboratory.”

Israel aims to vaccinate much of its population by March and get the economy going again, allowing the tiny nation beside the Mediterranean sea to serve as a global showcase for how to beat back the deadly virus. But the ultraorthodox have undermined those lofty goals, largely by bucking lockdowns and shying from vaccines.

Israel’s ultraorthodox make up about 12% of the population but account for nearly one-third of the country’s coronavirus infections. Israel currently has 68,331 active coronavirus cases with new infections hovering at about 7,000 a day.

Officials are scrambling to get the latest surge under control. A British variant of the virus accounts for about 70% of current coronavirus infections, even as almost one-third of Israelis have received the first dose of a vaccination. Prime Minister

Benjamin Netanyahu

last month banned all international flights and lawmakers passed a bill Sunday doubling fines for lockdown violations.

Ultraorthodox Jews argued with Israeli police officers during a protest over coronavirus lockdown restrictions in Ashdod last month.



Photo:

Oded Balilty/Associated Press

Public health officials say the ultra-Orthodox community is particularly vulnerable to the fast-moving virus. Their large families typically live in crowded apartments and traditionally shun electronic communication that helps get information out about the vaccines.

Data from Israel’s health ministry shows Israel’s ultraorthodox are getting vaccinated at a lower rate than other groups. Among those over 60, to whom the campaign has been open the longest, 85% of all Israelis have taken the vaccine, compared with 78% of Israel’s ultraorthodox.

Ultraorthodox and Arab towns are lagging behind in overall immunity to the virus due to the lower vaccination rates, according to

Eran Segal,

a computational biologist at the Weizmann Institute of Science who presented his findings to Israel’s government on Sunday evening. “It’s going to slow down the decline of the pandemic,” said Mr. Segal.

Health officials say that infections in ultraorthodox communities have gone down in recent days, as some leading rabbis have endorsed vaccinations. There are also efforts under way to combat misinformation and get residents to take the vaccine.

In the large ultraorthodox city of Bnei Brak, local officials have set up a war room. In the oval-shaped, wood-paneled room on the top floor of city hall, with portraits of important religious figures lining the walls, young ultraorthodox sit around a large circular table with large jugs of hand sanitizer and work the phones. They stare at spreadsheets with information about everyone who has or hasn’t been vaccinated.

Officials had called nearly 10,000 people who hadn’t been vaccinated—and spoken with nearly 7,000 of them. About 5,000 said they wanted a vaccine but hadn’t been able to get one yet. Another 1,500 or so didn’t want to be vaccinated. The city officials work to overcome any obstacles raised on the calls.

For those who don’t have a ride to a vaccination center, they arrange one. If would-be vaccine recipients can’t get in touch with their health insurance providers, they also help. And if anyone they reach doesn’t want to take the vaccine, they note why.

Avi Blumenthal, who leads the health ministry’s outreach to the ultraorthodox, said he and his staff are combing through lists of Israel’s ultraorthodox towns to find the rabbis who are against vaccination, and seeking answers. In one instance, an ultraorthodox community in Jerusalem had low vaccine rates that many attributed to its rabbi’s alleged antivaccine stance. But when health officials interviewed the rabbi, they learned he was actually pro-vaccine—someone had spread a rumor attributed to him that the vaccine is dangerous.

An ultraorthodox Jewish man received a coronavirus vaccine in Jerusalem last month.



Photo:

abir sultan/epa/Shutterstock

Yehuda Shaish,

63, who runs four ultra-Orthodox schools in Bnei Brak and nearby towns, said he waited until the rabbis blessed the vaccines. “After the rabbis authorized it, I went happily,” he said.

Even with rabbis’ blessings, many ultraorthodox remain skeptical about vaccines. Yedidya Hasson, 28, who manages a network of WhatsApp groups with 30,000 people in which some members have questioned the wisdom of vaccines and coronavirus restrictions, says he won’t take the vaccine at least for now because he fears possible health risks.

“When it comes to vaccines,” he said, “I think that the media in Israel is hiding the truth.”

Some ultraorthodox leaders say that while community mistrust may help to explain resistance to vaccines and recent displays of civil disobedience, that distrust doesn’t justify violating rules that endanger public health. “You expect from religious men to be more moral,” said Rabbi

Dov Halbertal,

a prominent ultraorthodox lawyer and commentator. “But when it comes to the biggest test of saving lives, we are failing.”

Israel says it’s on track to vaccinate everyone over 16 by the end of March. To understand how the small country has vaccinated more of its population than any other so quickly, WSJ visited clinics that are giving shots to young and middle-aged citizens. Photo: Tamir Elterman for The Wall Street Journal

Write to Felicia Schwartz at Felicia.Schwartz@wsj.com

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World

Vaccination Delays Put Global Rebound at Risk

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Timetables for vaccinating enough people to effectively curb Covid-19 are slipping in many countries, raising fears that a large portion of the world will still be battling the pandemic and its economic effects well into 2022 or beyond.

While the U.S. and some other mostly small countries are making progress toward vaccinating most of their populations by late summer, health experts and economists are concluding that much of the planet—including parts of Europe, Asia and Latin America—face a longer slog.

Places from Germany to Mexico are running into serious problems sourcing sufficient vaccines. Other countries with low caseloads are less pressed to start vaccination campaigns and aren’t eager to reopen borders anytime soon.

Just 10 countries are on track to vaccinate more than a third of their population this year. People being vaccinated in Salisbury Cathedral in the U.K. in recent days.



Photo:

neil hall/EPA/Shutterstock

At the current rates of vaccination, only about 10% of the world would be inoculated by the end of the year and 21% by the close of 2022,

UBS

says. Just 10 countries are on track to vaccinate more than one-third of their population this year.

The UBS data includes hard-hit middle-income countries such as South Africa where vaccination rates are expected to be painfully slow, though some countries it measured are expected to increase the pace of vaccinations soon.




Economies on target to vaccinate one-third of the population in 2021

Economies on target to vaccinate one-third of the population in 2021

Economies on target to vaccinate one-third of the population in 2021

Economies on target to vaccinate one-third of the population in 2021

But richer regions such as Europe are also facing delays. European officials in recent days watched as their goal of vaccinating 70% of the population by summer looked unachievable after doses ran out in some places, with just 2% of European Union residents covered so far. 

The differing pace in vaccine rollouts world-wide raises the prospect of divergent economic fortunes for the world’s main economic blocs, at least in the near term. The U.S. economy could grow by 5.1% this year, according to International Monetary Fund forecasts, but recoveries of the eurozone and developing economies have become more uncertain given vaccination delays.

The U.S. and a few other countries could wind up enjoying many benefits of herd immunity but still be unable to fully mend their economies because they are waiting on other places to catch up. With borders shut globally, some businesses even in vaccinated countries would have to rely on domestic demand.

“So long as the pandemic terrorizes part of the world, normality will not be restored anywhere,” said

Erik Nielsen,

chief economist at UniCredit Bank.

Uneven vaccine distribution also means that Covid-19 could keep circulating for years, especially in nations such as Brazil and South Africa, where new infections are vastly outpacing inoculations. Both have become breeding grounds for more infectious new strains. In time, virologists expect the virus could mutate—in particular, modifying the shape of its outer protein spikes—an outcome they fear might ultimately render our current vaccines less effective.

Many scientists and policy makers predicted immunization programs would take a long time. Still, the unusually rapid development of vaccines raised hopes that 2021 would mark a return to normal for most of the world. Economists began upgrading their forecasts.

Global growth is still expected to be strong this year, and residents of many countries including the U.S. will undoubtedly see restaurants filling up and other signs of progress. The recovery is already so strong in some places that supplies of semiconductors are running short.

Mexico, where gravediggers buried a Covid-19 victim in Panteón Sueños Eternos in November, has immunized just 0.5% of its population.



Photo:

Briana Sanchez/The El Paso Times/Associated Press

The U.S. and U.K. also experienced some early delays rolling out vaccine campaigns, only to see distribution pick up as snags were worked out.

Still, the outlook is growing considerably more uncertain elsewhere.

Borders are closing across much of Europe. New Zealand Prime Minister

Jacinda Ardern

said last week the country would continue to bar international visitors through most of 2021. A senior Australian health official recently made a similar prediction, in part because it isn’t clear whether Covid-19 vaccines prevent transmission of the virus or just stop people from getting severely ill.

Even the world’s fastest-vaccinating country—Israel—remains in a lockdown, with international flights banned indefinitely.

“This assumption that when Jan. 1 came we could just burn the old calendar and everything would be fine is proving to be a wildly optimistic view,” said

Robert Carnell,

an ING Group economist in Singapore.

Brazil, where new infections far outpace inoculations, has become a breeding ground for new strains, with hospitals like this one in Manaus on the front lines.



Photo:

Sandro Pereira/Fotoarena/Zuma Press

The World Bank has forecast that remittances to the developing world—a vital lifeline—will fall 7.5% this year, after a 7% drop in 2020. Concert halls and schools might remain closed longer than expected.

Hotels in places such as Southeast Asia and the Pacific aren’t expecting business to fully rebound until the middle of next year. Many international students could be absent from university campuses until mid-2022.

“I’ve just been on the phone this morning to some lovely American clients,” said Mark Fraenkel, who owns Blue Dive Port Douglas, a scuba-diving business near Australia’s Great Barrier Reef. “I said, ‘Let’s not book you for 2021. We’ll just have to cancel.’ ”

Shippers, including DHL, are expecting air freight to get tighter for the first part of this year, not better, because fewer planes are flying to carry cargo. Discussions at the United Nations to normalize air traffic by creating a vaccine passport or even a common set of rules for tests are snagged in U.N. bureaucracy.

SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS

What do you think international business will look like in 2021? Join the conversation below.

Intercontinental flight traffic won’t return to 2019 levels until 2023 at the earliest, the International Air Transport Association forecasts.

“We’re talking about years rather than months, and it’s partly related to the two-speed vaccination,” said Senior IATA Vice President Nick Careen. “We need governments to agree on a process; we can’t continue to operate like this.”

A central problem is that it is proving hard to scale up vaccine production quickly. Delayed deliveries can have domino effects on other buyers.

In Europe, where several top vaccines are made, production issues emerged last month with factories saying they couldn’t keep up. Frustrated, the EU introduced new measures on Friday that would let it block exports to wealthier countries, such as Canada, Japan or the U.S.

Slow production at a Belgian plant has meant Canadian officials recently received 70% fewer doses of a

Pfizer

vaccine. The same troubles have left Japan struggling to get doses it needs to vaccinate its population by the end of June, a crunch that may mean few fans for Tokyo’s Summer Olympics in July.


“I can’t tell you which month,” said

Taro Kono,

the minister in charge of Japan’s vaccine rollout, when asked when the general public could get immunized.

China also faces challenges. Although it has started inoculations using homegrown vaccines, without providing a firm timeline for reaching herd immunity, approvals and production arrangements have come more slowly than anticipated, according to Trivium China, a consultancy.

In one sign of the difficulties, the Beijing government’s talent office said that vaccine producer Sinovac is struggling to hire new staff.

“The main issue is production volume,” said

Guo Wei,

deputy secretary general of the health-care logistics association at the government-backed China Federation of Logistics and Purchasing, in an interview. He said that based on production estimates by China’s vaccine makers, the country wouldn’t be able to reach herd immunity this year.

Trivium estimates that a total of 850 million doses is the high end of what is possible for China this year, while administering at least 1.68 billion doses would be considered full inoculation. The Economist Intelligence Unit doesn’t rule out some major Chinese cities reaching herd immunity this year but estimates that the country as a whole likely won’t be able to reach it until late 2022.

Any production delays in China could affect other countries. Morocco planned to vaccinate 80% of its population in the coming months, in part using Chinese vaccines, but officials say they haven’t received all the supplies they need and have blamed manufacturers that can’t keep up.

Analysts doubt other countries can reach their stated targets. In Indonesia, officials want to vaccinate 65% of a population of 270 million in 15 months, which would more likely take three to four years, according to analysts at IMA Asia. The Philippines aims to vaccinate 70 million people this year.

A nurse vaccinated a health-care worker in Liege, Belgium, as European Union officials grow concerned that just 2% of EU residents have been vaccinated. 



Photo:

Francisco Seco/Associated Press

“We doubt if half the 2021 goal can be reached,” IMA Asia said in a recent report.

Latin America’s two largest countries, Brazil and Mexico, have so far immunized just 0.8% and 0.5% of their populations, respectively. Argentina planned to receive five million doses of Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine in January, but only 800,000 have been delivered because of production delays in Russia.

Nigeria’s 206 million people have only one delivery scheduled, of 100,000 doses, expected next month.

Meanwhile, more people are putting plans on hold.

Mohammed Waqas,

a 25-year-old in London, initially aimed to start a master’s program in teaching at an Australian university in February. Mr. Waqas decided to defer enrollment until at least July because Australia’s border is closed to most international visitors. If the border isn’t open by July, he could defer until 2022.

“I’m one year behind where I would like to be,” Mr. Waqas said.

—Chao Deng, Peter Landers and Samantha Pearson contributed to this article.

Write to Drew Hinshaw at drew.hinshaw@wsj.com and Mike Cherney at mike.cherney@wsj.com

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Health

Some Health-Care Workers Are Still Saying No to a Covid-19 Vaccine

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Officials from Ohio said recently that 60% of nursing-home staff so far haven’t elected to take the vaccine. In New York,

Gov. Andrew Cuomo

said this month that state officials expect 30% of health-care workers offered the vaccine will ultimately turn it down. Two-thirds of the staff at a Florida hospital refused the vaccine this month, leaving so many unused doses that the facility started giving away shots to the general public.

The hesitancy among health-care workers concerns public-health officials who expected America’s front-line workers to serve as a model for others.

“Please get vaccinated,”

Anthony Fauci,

who is serving as President Biden’s chief medical adviser for the Covid-19 pandemic, said in a video message to health-care providers. “It’s important to protect yourselves, to protect your family, but as important, symbolically, as health-care providers, to show confidence in the vaccine so that other people in this country follow suit.”

In a survey of 1,563 respondents conducted in January by researchers at the Kaiser Family Foundation, 79% of U.S. adults who haven’t yet been vaccinated say they would be likely to turn to a doctor, nurse or other health-care provider when deciding whether to get a vaccination.

Meanwhile, 28% of 128 health-care workers in the Kaiser survey said they want to wait and see how the vaccine is working for other people before getting it themselves. While they weren’t the most resistant group the foundation studied, their outsize influence over whether members of the general public would choose to get the vaccine concerns public-health officials.

Surveys of vaccine skepticism of broader populations have shown that people have become less hesitant as they see others vaccinated.

Some health-care workers say they’ve passed up the shot for altruistic reasons, believing that others should get it first. Several health-care systems said they have struggled to persuade female employees to get vaccinated due to a lack of data about the vaccines’ impact on pregnancy. Other health-care workers say while they want to encourage others to get vaccinated, when it comes to their own health, they are still wary.

“As I was getting my first shot, I asked the two nurses who were administering it to me how they felt when they got the shot. And they were on the side of waiting. That scared me a little bit, but I went through with it,” said

Charles Smith II,

chief financial officer at Vibrant Health in Kansas City, Kan.

At the system of clinics where Mr. Smith works, about 30% of the staff have decided against getting the vaccine to this point, according to Vibrant Health’s chief executive,

Patrick Sallee.

Mr. Smith said he felt uncomfortable with the speed of the process and the lack of long-term data, but news that a more highly transmissible virus variant was spreading made him take the leap. “There is an expectation for the health industry to lead other industries to say this thing is safe and lead by example,” he said. “I feel like I’m shaking the dice, really.”

Mr. Smith, CFO at a health-clinic system, and Dr. Jackson-Smith, a dentist, felt reluctant about a Covid-19 vaccine but decided to lead by example and get the shot.



Photo:

Katie Currid for The Wall Street Journal

Mr. Smith’s wife, Aniika Jackson-Smith, a dentist, said she also hesitated to get a vaccine because she doesn’t feel enough is known about their long-term effects. She said she finally decided to make an appointment to get the first shot in late January because she feels a responsibility as a health-care provider not to discourage others from getting it.

“My mind isn’t really changed,” she said. “But I guess in order for us to get past this, people are just going to have to take the vaccine or we’ll just be here forever.”

Heidi Arthur,

chief campaign development officer at the Ad Council, which has been running a large-scale public-service education effort about the Covid-19 vaccines, said getting health-care workers on board wasn’t originally part of the plan.

“It was surprising, the level of hesitancy,” she said.

Covid-19 Vaccine’s Last Mile

Instead of health-care workers lining up, the Ad Council found themselves pulling together a diverse group of leaders within the industry, including Dr. Fauci, to educate other health-care workers about the vaccines and address their concerns.

For Susan Izzo, an adult nurse practitioner in Connecticut, her initial hesitancy was because she felt her patients deserved the vaccine before her. Ultimately, her patients persuaded her to get the shots, she said, so that she could be healthy to protect them.

“I didn’t feel like it was my turn, even though as a health-care worker it is my turn. I would have gladly given up my vaccine to my 55-year-old patient who just had a lung transplant,” she said.

Deborah Burger,

a president at National Nurses United, the largest nurses’ union in the U.S., said many nurses felt information about vaccines that came out during the Trump administration was politicized and wanted to learn more so they could decide for themselves whether it was safe. Education and more information, she said, is increasing uptake among nurses.

Dawn Allen,

vice president of patient services at Huron Regional Medical Center in South Dakota, said at first less than 50% of their workforce chose to be vaccinated. After sitting down with staff to answer their questions, particularly around concerns of infertility, she said they are up to 76% of staff choosing to be vaccinated over a two-week period.

Still, some nurses say they have no intention of getting vaccinated.

SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS

Should health-care workers be forced to take the vaccine? Why or why not? Join the conversation below.

Cleon Charles,

a traveling nurse who has been working in Covid-19 hot spots throughout the pandemic, said she would never get the vaccine and has discouraged her daughters and parents from getting it, despite having had Covid-19 herself.

She cited a general mistrust of the pharmaceutical industry, among other concerns, and the death of baseball legend Hank Aaron, who publicly received the Covid-19 vaccine in early January. Medical officials say the baseball legend died of natural causes, but his death has been taken up by antivaccination leaders, including

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

, who called the death “part of a wave of suspicious deaths among elderly closely following administration of #COVID #vaccines,” on Twitter.

“I don’t want it,” Ms. Charles said. “I’ll take my chances and my vitamins.”

Write to Julie Wernau at Julie.Wernau@wsj.com

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Health

New Playbook for Covid-19 Protection Emerges After Year of Study, Missteps

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Scientists are settling on a road map that can help critical sectors of the economy safely conduct business, from meatpacking plants to financial services, despite the pandemic’s continued spread.

After nearly a year of study, the lessons include: Mask-wearing, worker pods and good air flow are much more important than surface cleaning, temperature checks and plexiglass barriers in places like offices and restaurants. And more public-health experts now advocate wide use of cheap, rapid tests to detect cases quickly, in part because many scientists now think more than 50% of infections are transmitted by people without symptoms.

The playbook comes after months of investigations on how the coronavirus spreads and affects the body. Scientists combined that with knowledge gained from years of experience managing occupational-health hazards in high-risk workplaces, such as factories and chemical plants, where tiny airborne pollutants can build up and cause harm. They say different types of workplaces—taking into account the types of interactions workers have—need slightly different protocols.

The safety measures have taken on new urgency in recent weeks as new infections, hospitalizations and deaths rise across the U.S. and Europe, and potentially more-transmissible variants of the virus spread around the globe. This phase of the pandemic is prompting a new wave of stay-at-home orders, closures and travel restrictions, important first steps to curbing contagion. Infection-prevention specialists say known strategies for stemming spread should continue to work against the new variants, but that increased adherence is even more important.

Vaccines are rolling out, but slowly, and access will be limited mostly to high-priority groups for some time.

“We have to still deal with ‘the right now.’ We’ve zeroed in on this set of controls that we know work,” said

Joseph Allen,

director of the Healthy Buildings Program at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

Over the past year, the lack of consistent and cohesive messaging among scientists and lawmakers has seeded confusion over what makes up risky behavior, what activities should be avoided and why. That is beginning to change as consensus builds and scientists better understand the virus.

In the U.S., scientists at first advised people against wearing masks, in part because of shortages, while the idea of stay-at-home orders received severe pushback from some lawmakers. Early in the pandemic, testing was limited to people with symptoms, also partly due to shortages. That advice has shifted, but a year later, sufficient testing remains a critical issue.

London’s Regent Street was nearly empty last week.



Photo:

May James/SOPA Images /Zuma Press

Countries such as New Zealand and others in Asia adhered to a combination of basic mitigation strategies from the start—particularly masking, large-scale testing and lockdowns that broke transmission chains. They have tended to fare better than those that didn’t.

In one of his first moves, President

Biden

signed executive orders to require masks be worn on federal property and at airports and other transportation hubs. The administration said it is focusing on increasing the availability of vaccines, and also stressed the importance of widely available testing, which still lags in low-income and minority communities.

The current scientific playbook follows from two of the biggest research insights since the start of the pandemic. First, individuals who aren’t showing symptoms can transmit the virus. Infectious-disease experts worry most about this silent spread and say it is the reason the pandemic has been so hard to contain. While visibly sick people can pass on the virus, data cited by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimate that 40% to 45% of those infected never develop symptoms at all. With the new viral variants that can transmit more readily, the potential for silent spread is even higher, infectious-disease experts said.

Secondly, researchers now know that tiny airborne particles known as aerosols play a role in the spread of Covid-19. These can linger in the air and travel beyond 6 feet.

An early hallmark of the pandemic response focused on the risk of transmission through large respiratory droplets that typically travel a few feet and then fall to the ground. Businesses rushed to buy plexiglass barriers, creating shortages.

The barriers can be good at preventing larger virus-containing droplets from landing on and infecting healthy individuals. They may offer some protection in shielding workers who have brief face-to-face interactions with many people throughout the workday, such as cashiers and receptionists, some occupational-health experts said.

Yet in settings like offices, restaurants or gyms, the role of the barriers is murkier, because activities like talking loudly and breathing deeply create aerosols that can waft on air currents and get around shields.

A Los Angeles Apparel employee added plexiglass to sewing stations in July.



Photo:

Sarah Reingewirtz/Orange County Register/Zuma Press

Outdoor diners at Eat At Joe’s restaurant in Redondo Beach, Calif., in December.



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patrick t. fallon/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images

A gym in Milan in October.



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DANIEL DAL ZENNARO/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock

Also, installing such barriers could affect airflow throughout the space, environmental-health experts said. It is possible they could limit proper ventilation, making things worse, they said.

“There seems to be an assumption that particles are going to get stopped by the barriers, which is simply not true,” said

Lisa Brosseau,

an industrial hygienist and research consultant for the University of Minnesota’s Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy. Airborne particles ferrying the virus “really distribute all over the place.”

The emphasis on intense surface cleaning has diminished as scientists have come to understand that indirect transmission through contaminated surfaces doesn’t play as critical a role in the spread of Covid-19 as they thought in the early days of the pandemic. In September, the CDC published sanitation guidelines for offices, workplaces, homes and schools that said that, for most surfaces, normal, routine cleaning should suffice, and that frequently touched objects, such as light switches and doorknobs, should be cleaned and disinfected.

“Sanitation is important in general always,” said

Deborah Roy,

president of the American Society of Safety Professionals. “The idea is we went overboard at the beginning because of the amount of unknowns. Now, we’re in a situation where we have more information.”

Temperature checks have become less popular among some employers because scientists now know that not all Covid-19 patients get fevers. One large study published online in November in the New England Journal of Medicine showed only 13% of Covid-19 patients reported a fever during the course of their illness.

Scientists now understand that brief encounters with an infected person can lead to spread, according to an October case study—an advance from earlier, when the rule of thumb was to avoid close contact for 15 consecutive minutes or longer. The report urged people to consider not just time and proximity in defining close contact with a Covid case, but also ventilation, crowding and a person’s likelihood of generating aerosols. Following the report, the CDC changed its definition of close contact to a total of 15 minutes or more over a 24-hour period.

A flight attendant showed an air filter on LATAM airlines in Bogota in August.



Photo:

juan barreto/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images

Fresh air and effective filters indoors are important because they can remove virus particles before they have time to infect.

Masks offer a similar benefit, by lowering the amount of particles that infected individuals emit. Some scientists say there could be a benefit to doubling up on masks, as a second layer may improve both filtration and fit, so long as the masks are worn correctly.

A study published in October found that in countries where mask wearing was the norm or where governments put in place mask mandates, coronavirus mortality rates grew much more slowly than in countries without such measures. This fall, the CDC said that masks also offer some personal protection by reducing a wearer’s exposure to infected particles.

As the weather gets colder and people head indoors, the risk of catching Covid-19 is rising. WSJ explains why air ventilation and filtration are one of our biggest defenses against the coronavirus this winter. Illustration: Nick Collingwood/WSJ

The combination of airborne particles and personal interactions, even among people who don’t feel ill, can turn wedding receptions, plane rides and choir practices into superspreading, potentially deadly events.

“For Covid, those two factors—asymptomatic spread and aerosolization—is what made mask-wearing so essential,” said

Megan Ranney,

emergency physician and assistant dean at Brown University.

Lessons can be gleaned from an outbreak at a Canadian spin studio last fall. The operators of the SPINCO studio in Hamilton, Ontario, had many public-health measures in place, including limiting the number of bikes in each class and screening staff and attendees with a questionnaire about topics including symptoms and travel. Rooms were sanitized within 30 minutes of a completed class, and towels were laundered, according to a statement provided last fall by

Elizabeth Richardson,

medical officer of health for the city of Hamilton.

Masks were also required before and after workout classes, Dr. Richardson said.

In total, 54 people who attended workouts over a span of several classes became infected. Another 31 cases were tied to the outbreak after spin-class attendees who contracted the virus then passed it on. The spin studio temporarily shut down following the outbreak and later reopened. It is currently not offering classes due to local regulations that mandated the closure of all gyms and fitness centers amid rising Covid-19 cases in the area.

In a November statement following the outbreak,

Michelle August,

founder of SPINCO, said that the company has “always put safety first and [has] exceeded all recommended guidelines from public health throughout” the pandemic. She said SPINCO has also strengthened and heightened its Covid-19 mitigation measures. SPINCO’s website currently says face masks are mandated throughout workouts in the company’s Hamilton location.

It also says that SPINCO is installing air purifiers in all of its studios that filter air in the rooms every 17 to 21 minutes. Airborne transmission experts recommend that building managers pump in clean, fresh air between three to six times an hour and that they install filters that are proven to effectively trap and remove a substantial number of virus-carrying particles.

To film a stage play of “A Christmas Carol” in November, the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis upgraded its air filters and increased the rate at which the ventilation system pumps in outside air, said

Brooke Hajinian,

the Guthrie’s general manager. Management staggered arrival times, and a compliance officer made sure everyone socially distanced, wore their masks properly and washed their hands.

The theater divided staff into pods depending on how close they must get to the lone actor on stage, who portrayed Charles Dickens and didn’t wear a mask while performing, according to Ms. Hajinian. Those working nearest the stage underwent testing three times a week and wore N95 masks at all times, she said, while cleaning and security crews, who didn’t interact with the stage crews, wore cloth masks and didn’t undergo testing.

Actor Nathaniel Fuller performed in ‘A Christmas Carol’ at the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis.



Photo:

Kaitlin Schlick

Ms. Hajinian said she monitored the staff’s testing results and symptoms. “Any symptom is not a failure of this plan,” she said. Catching a case “and isolating it—that’s what success looks like for us,” she said. There were no cases, she said.

Scientists say multilayered safety efforts are needed because no single prevention method is 100% effective.

One of the largest studies of asymptomatic transmission to date showed that frequent testing was essential in identifying infections among a group of nearly 2,000 Marine recruits required to socially distance and wear masks except while eating and sleeping.

The study looked at cases identified with lab-based tests that search out and amplify the genetic material of the virus, but those tests aren’t as easily scaled as so-called rapid antigen tests, which search for viral proteins.

Results from lab-based tests can sometimes take days, while results from rapid tests are usually available in less than an hour. As a result, some epidemiologists have been advocating for widespread use of antigen tests to prevent outbreaks, because they are cheaper and don’t require high-tech laboratory equipment to run, meaning they can be deployed in a broader range of settings.

The shift toward using frequent, inexpensive and rapid tests on the same people multiple times a week to screen entire populations—instead of one-time tests on individuals who have symptoms—will be important to efficiently break transmission chains, epidemiologists said.

“Unless we’re doing really broad, frequent screening of the people at large, we’re completely missing the vast majority” of infections, said

Michael Mina,

an assistant professor of epidemiology at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. “We have to change how we’re doing this.”

A Covid-19 testing site at the Alemany Farmers Market in San Francisco in November.



Photo:

David Paul Morris/Bloomberg News

While rapid tests tend to be less sensitive than lab-based tests, Dr. Mina said the data suggest they have high sensitivity when people are most likely to be infectious.

Other infectious-disease experts have touted contact tracing to identify and bust clusters of infection. But they say the strategy works best when cases aren’t surging, as they are now. When transmission rates are too high, limiting gatherings, travel and crowding are more effective at denting spread, said

Abraar Karan,

a global-health physician at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School.

In places without big surges, a high-tech approach is becoming increasingly useful: genetic epidemiology, or tracking tiny changes in viral genomes to map out transmission chains. As the coronavirus replicates and moves from person to person, its genes change slightly. Sometimes, those tiny changes are unusual, and they can be particularly useful in mapping transmission events, according to

Justin O’Grady,

an infectious disease expert at the Quadram Institute in the U.K.

By sifting through the differences among more than 1,000 viral genomes, Dr. O’Grady and his collaborators found that a particular viral variant was moving through multiple nursing homes in the U.K., among patients and staff, but not among the wider community. The unpublished data suggested that transmission was facilitated by the movement of staff from one facility to another, Dr. O’Grady said. The team relayed the findings to government authorities and advised them to restrict staff moving among facilities during the pandemic.

“Sometimes genomic epidemiology is able to find hidden transmission links that traditional epidemiology would struggle to find,” Dr. O’Grady said. “We can’t stop transmission, but when we find a superspreader event…we can bring in the right prevention methods to stop it from spreading further.”

A London ad urged safety measures last week.



Photo:

Dinendra Haria/London News Pictures /Zuma Press

—Betsy McKay contributed to this article.

Write to Daniela Hernandez at daniela.hernandez@wsj.com, Sarah Toy at sarah.toy@wsj.com and Caitlin McCabe at caitlin.mccabe@wsj.com

Copyright ©2020 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8

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Health

U.K. Coronavirus Variant Probed for Increased Risk to Younger People

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LONDON—Doctors began noticing the change last month as the U.K.’s new coronavirus variant spread. In hospital critical-care units, they were seeing more younger people and women with serious cases of Covid-19, a disease that previously inflicted its worst symptoms largely on older patients and men.

The shift—backed up now by statistical studies—is part of an urgent puzzle preoccupying British public-health officials as they race to understand a strain of the virus that is more transmissible and, some studies indicate, could be deadlier than earlier versions.

One early hypothesis, scientists say, is that one of the virus’s genetic mutations makes it better at invading a greater number of cells inside the body, leading to serious sickness in people who with previous Covid-19 variants would only have had mild or no symptoms.

David Strain, a physician and instructor at the University of Exeter’s medical school who is also treating Covid-19 patients, said initial research paints a picture of a virus variant that is like a burglar that has become better and breaking and entering—into vulnerable cells in this case, not houses.

“We think that’s why it’s making people sicker as well as being more transmissible,” Dr. Strain said.

Virologists suspect that it is a particular mutation known as N501Y on the new variant’s spike protein that has enhanced its ability to enter and infect human cells and to move more efficiently through the human body.

Some doctors, such as Dr. Strain, think that is behind the rise in younger people and women—who for most of the pandemic have become ill at lower rates—ending up in the hospital.

Some things, doctors and scientists say, don’t seem to have changed with the new variant. Once hospitalized, patients seem to have the same chance of survival as before and doctors can’t tell from symptoms which variant a patient has.

In London, the southeast and east of England, where the new variant was first identified in a test sample from Sept. 20, the mean age of patients admitted to intensive-care units fell from 61.4 years between September and the end of November to 58.9 years from Dec. 1 to Jan. 21.

The proportion of women admitted into ICUs rose from 30.1% to 35.1% in the same period. Data from the rest of the country show a similar pattern.

As new coronavirus variants sweep across the world, scientists are racing to understand how dangerous they could be. WSJ explains. Illustration: Alex Kuzoian/WSJ

Through December, the proportion of 18- to 54-year-olds admitted to English hospitals with Covid-19 also began to trend up, before a national lockdown was imposed on Jan. 4.

Not all doctors are convinced this is explained by mutations in the new variant. Some think it could also be a matter of behavior changes, with more people, especially younger ones, mixing during the holiday season and becoming infected.

Luke Allen, a local doctor in Oxford, for instance, said he has been treating more younger patients but that he is seeing more Covid-19 patients in general, and the ratio of people seems to be the same as in the first peak.

Parts of London have been hit particularly hard by the new virus variant.



Photo:

May James/Zuma Press

He attributes the increased numbers to the greater transmissibility of the new variant and increased socializing over the holidays. “That increases the chances of their contact with us,” Dr. Allen said.

There is still considerable debate around whether the new variant is in fact deadlier, as some research suggests.

The new variant, which has become the dominant version across the U.K., is estimated to be 30% to 70% more infectious than earlier varieties. Last week, a government health advisory panel said studies suggest there was a realistic possibility that it also could be 30% to 40% deadlier than the previous variant.

The advisers say their conclusions are tentative. “Although there’s uncertainty, we can’t always wait for certainty,” said

Peter Horby,

chairman of the panel, the New and Emerging Respiratory Virus Threats Advisory Group, or Nervtag.

Julian Tang, a clinical virologist and professor of respiratory medicine at the University of Leicester, said more evidence was needed to prove that the new variant was deadlier, given that social mixing was allowed during the winter months, greatly accelerating hospitalization rates.

“Viruses generally mutate to be more transmissible and less lethal,” he said.

The new variant’s spread has coincided with huge increases in the number of people hospitalized with Covid-19 and a rise in the number of people dying from the disease in the U.K., placing the state-run health service under unprecedented strain. Covid-19-related deaths in the U.K. are close to 100,000 since the start of the pandemic.

The disease caused by the variant so far doesn’t appear any different from that provoked by its ancestors, but because the virus itself is able to move around a patient’s system more easily, it can outpace the body’s immune response, doctors suspect.

“If you are getting much stronger binding you may need a lower infectious dose to become infected, which would increase the risk of transmission,” Dr. Horby said. “Then, if it’s been able to spread between cells much quicker within the lungs, then that may increase the rate of disease and the rate of inflammation which may then progress quicker than your body can respond to.”

To determine whether the new variant was deadlier, scientists looked at data from around 850,000 cases of the coronavirus tested in the community where they knew which variant of the virus each person had, including between 1,400 and 1,900 people who died.

“You have to compare people who are as similar as possible to each other,” said

John Edmunds,

an author of one of the studies by the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine.

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The researchers matched groups of people based on age, sex and ethnicity as well as income and where they lived, to reduce the effect that pressure on hospitals might have had on death rates.

Dr. Edmunds’s group found that if two similar people had the coronavirus, the one who had the new variant was around 30% more likely to have died from the disease it causes. A group from Imperial College London found a similar likelihood of mortality with the new variant compared with its ancestor. University of Exeter researchers found a 91% increase in the risk of mortality from the new variant, though that could be because the population it examined skews older, Dr. Strain said.

Another study by Public Health England put the chances of dying after infection with the new variant around 65% higher than with the old version.

The results are preliminary and because only in around 10% of all the cases in the U.K. is the virus variant known, may not be representative of the population as a whole.

Write to Joanna Sugden at joanna.sugden@wsj.com and Max Colchester at max.colchester@wsj.com

Copyright ©2020 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8

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World

British Economy, Post Brexit and Pummeled by Covid, Is Worst in G-7

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The U.K.’s economy shrank more last year than any of the G-7, in what the Bank of England says will be the country’s biggest economic slump in more than 300 years.

What went wrong? Shutdowns caused greater pain for the U.K. than other members of the Group of Seven advanced economies in part because it is especially dependent on consumer spending, which evaporated amid one of Europe’s deadliest Covid-19 outbreaks. The economy was already weak after the four years of negotiations over Britain’s exit from the European Union, during which business investment sagged and households held back on spending.

This is the starting point for Britain’s new relationship with the EU, which began Jan. 1 with a loose free-trade agreement. Earlier this month, Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced another nationwide lockdown to fight a new, more-contagious variant of the coronavirus. That puts the U.K. economy on course to shrink again in the first quarter of the year, when businesses must also get to grips with new European trading arrangements.

Growth in the U.K. was already weak going into the pandemic because of feeble business investment, poor productivity and scant growth in incomes. Once the coronavirus set in, the British economy shrank by more than its peers in the G-7 in the first nine months of the year. Figures for the final quarter, due Feb. 12, are expected to show the economy contracted again.

The U.K. took a bigger hit because around 13% of its annual gross domestic product comes from spending on recreation and culture and in restaurants and hotels, a higher share than any other G-7 country. Businesses that depend on direct contact with consumers—bars and restaurants, sports events, hotels and theaters, cinemas and museums—were hobbled when social distancing became the norm and when the spread of the virus forced them to close. The current lockdown, in place through mid-February, closes schools and nonessential shops, and people have been told to leave home only if necessary.

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Business

China Overtakes U.S. as World’s Leading Destination for Foreign Direct Investment

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China overtook the U.S. as the world’s top destination for new foreign direct investment last year, as the Covid-19 pandemic amplifies an eastward shift in the center of gravity of the global economy.

New investments by overseas businesses into the U.S., which for decades held the No. 1 spot, fell 49% in 2020, according to U.N. figures released Sunday, as the country struggled to curb the spread of the new coronavirus and economic output slumped.

China, long ranked No. 2, saw direct investments by foreign companies climb 4%, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development said. Beijing used strict lockdowns to largely contain Covid-19 after the disease first emerged in a central Chinese city, and China’s gross domestic product grew even as most other major economies contracted last year.

The 2020 investment numbers underline China’s move toward the center of a global economy long dominated by the U.S.—a shift accelerated during the pandemic as China has cemented its position as the world’s factory floor and expanded its share of global trade.

While China attracted more new inflows last year, the total stock of foreign investment in the U.S. remains much larger, reflecting the decades it has spent as the most attractive location for foreign businesses looking to expand outside their home markets.

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World

U.K. Covid-19 Variant Could Be More Deadly, British Officials Say

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LONDON—British officials warned Friday that a coronavirus variant first identified in the U.K. might be more lethal as well as more transmissible than previous versions of the pathogen.

The conclusions of scientists advising the British government are still highly uncertain. But British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said in a televised address that the variant—which has caused Covid-19 infections across the U.K. to spike and is spreading rapidly in the U.S.—could result in higher death rates.

U.S. federal health authorities have said it is likely to become the dominant variant in the U.S. by March.

“We have been informed today that, in addition to spreading more quickly, it also now appears that there is some evidence that the new variant—the variant that was first identified in London and the South East—may be associated with a higher degree of mortality,” said Mr. Johnson.

The tentative conclusions come as British hospitals cope with more Covid-19 patients than at any time during the pandemic. The Covid-19 death toll in the U.K. is expected to pass 100,000 in the coming week.

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Health

Studies of South African Coronavirus Strain Raise Concerns About Immune Response

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JOHANNESBURG—Three new laboratory studies are raising concerns that the immune response triggered by a Covid-19 infection or vaccination may be less effective at protecting against the new strain of the coronavirus that first emerged in South Africa.

The findings come from experiments done in the laboratory and only look at certain elements of a body’s immune response. Still, they reinforce the possibility that vaccine makers and regulators will need to update Covid-19 vaccines as the virus evolves.

A fourth study, conducted by scientists at BioNTech SE and Pfizer Inc. and published by the companies, showed that their vaccine successfully neutralized a variant that was initially detected in the U.K. That study didn’t include the South African strain.

The U.K. variant has already spread to many other countries, including the U.S.

More than a year into the pandemic, the discovery of new variants that appear to have made the virus more contagious is forcing researchers to adapt their understanding of the coronavirus that causes Covid-19. One concern, researchers said, is that the new strains are emerging in countries where a significant percentage of people have already built up an immune response to earlier variants after getting Covid-19.

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