New data suggests Covaxin generates robust memory to Covid-19 and variants six months after vaccination

Effectiveness of Covaxin against the Omicron variant is currently being studied

Ocugen announced that data analyzing immune response following two doses of the vaccine candidate, Covaxin (BBV152), from a third-party study were published on the preprint server, medRxiv. The data compared the immune memory response of 71 vaccinated and 73 naturally infected subjects with SARS-CoV-2, including variants of concern, for up to six months. The study found that Covaxin generated a robust immune memory against spike and nucleoprotein that was comparable to that following natural Covid-19 infection for the levels of antibodies, memory B cells and memory CD4+ T cells.  

In addition to controlling infections, the adaptive immune system creates immunological memory, such as memory B and T cells, to enable long-term protection against a virus. In the analysis, Covaxin generated T-cells against both spike and nucleocapsid proteins in nearly 85 percent of subjects that persisted for at least 6 months. This data supports previous findings that Covaxin is able to induce long-term memory.

“As a whole-virion inactivated vaccine, we anticipated Covaxin would produce an immune response against multiple antigens present in the SARS-CoV-2 virus, such as spike and nucleoprotein antibodies,” said Shankar Musunuri, PhD, MBA, Chairman of the Board, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Ocugen.

“The results of this analysis are extremely important findings as we continue to learn about how the virus is mutating and how we can address variants of concern with vaccines, especially with the emergence of Omicron,” said David Fajgenbaum, MD, MBA, MSc, FCPP, Assistant Professor of Medicine in Translational Medicine & Human Genetics at the University of Pennsylvania and member of Ocugen’s Vaccine Scientific Advisory Board. “Given that current variants of concern exhibit mutations concentrated in the spike protein of the virus, vaccines like Covaxin that can generate broad immune memory beyond the spike protein are a promising tool to protect us from emerging variants of concern.”  

Ocugen is currently evaluating Covaxin against the Omicron variant and plans to share the data as soon as they are available.