Will Kidney Transplant Recipients Need Third COVID-19 Vaccine Dose? NIH Starts Pilot Study

  • A trial has been launched to assess the antibody response of the third dose of COVID-19 messenger RNA vaccine in kidney transplant recipients who did not respond to two doses of the Moderna Inc MRNA or Pfizer Inc PFEBioNTech SE BNTX COVID-19 vaccine. 
  • The Phase 2 trial is funded by the NIH’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
  • The pilot study, called COVID Protection After Transplant (CPAT), will enroll up to 200 people aged 18 years or older who received a kidney transplant one year or more before enrollment and have had no recent organ rejection or change in immunosuppression. 
  • All participants will have had a low or no detectable antibody response to two doses of an mRNA vaccine.
  • The lifelong immunosuppressive therapy that organ transplant recipients must take to prevent organ rejection blunts their immune response to pathogens and vaccines. 
  • Research has shown that many organ transplant recipients do not develop antibodies against the COVID-19 vaccine regimen. 
  • The purpose of the new study is to determine whether a third dose of one of the mRNA COVID-19 shots could overcome this problem for at least some kidney transplant recipients. 
  • The study team will follow participants for one year after enrollment. Preliminary results are expected in September 2021.
  • Price Action: MRNA stock is down 2.9% at $470.52, BNTX stock is down 5.3% at $423.69, while PFE shares are up 4.4% at $48.01 during the market session on the last check Tuesday.
  • Photo by Johaehn from Pixabay
Market News and Data brought to you by Benzinga APIs
Comments
Loading...
Posted In:
Benzinga simplifies the market for smarter investing

Trade confidently with insights and alerts from analyst ratings, free reports and breaking news that affects the stocks you care about.

Join Now: Free!