On December 11, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted emergency use authorization for the first COVID-19 vaccine in the United States, after an expert advisory panel voted overwhelmingly that its benefits outweigh the risks.
Pfizer, BioNTech, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson have distributed vaccines nationwide. So what does this mean for HIV and AIDS patients?
According to the CDC (Center for Disease Control) both the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines employ a novel messenger RNA (mRNA) approach that uses nanoparticles, or fat bubbles, to deliver bits of genetic material that encode instructions for making the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein, which the coronavirus uses to enter human cells.
When injected into a muscle, the cells produce the protein, triggering an immune response. The mRNA degrades quickly in the body, and it does not alter human genes.
Clinical trials with findings published in the New England Medical Journal, which included about 30,000 people, showed that the Moderna vaccine was 94.1% effective in HIV patients according to FDA briefing documents released ahead of a public advisory committee meeting on December 17, 2020.
In this study, there were 196 cases of symptomatic COVID-19 observed at least 14 days after the second dose: 185 in the placebo group and 11 in the vaccine group. What’s more, Moderna presented additional data showing that the vaccine also appears to reduce asymptomatic infection by two thirds.
According to the FDA report, both trials enrolled people with stable HIV.
For more information, please visit FDA.org.