New corona vaccine: Novavax is coming – but by no means for everyone

IA number of German federal states are already debating: Who should and can actually get the new corona vaccine from the US manufacturer Novavax? Because distribution struggles and covetousness are already emerging.

Federal Health Minister Karl Lauterbach (SPD) had announced that vaccinations with Novavax can probably start in Germany at the end of February.

The first shipment of 1.75 million of the vaccine, which does not use mRNA technology, should be available from February 21, the health ministry said — but that’s significantly fewer units than the four million doses originally expected. It is therefore still open whether and when the missing batches will be delivered.

Brandenburg is already drawing consequences from the (temporary?) shortage. The new vaccine should initially only be available for nursing and medical staff, said Brandenburg Health Minister Ursula Nonnemacher (Greens) on Thursday during question time in the state parliament.

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Above all, those people who will be vaccinated from mid-March should be taken into account, said Nonnemacher – i.e. employees who work in the care sector. Vaccination of particularly vulnerable people should also have priority. Further deliveries from Novavax are hoped for from the end of February, the minister reported.

North Rhine-Westphalia also wants to prioritize

Similar discussions are also being held in other federal states, such as North Rhine-Westphalia. Novavax should also be available here first in the healthcare sector. The other corona vaccine, which is not quite correctly called “dead vaccine” in the vernacular, could be a bridge for one or the other in the health sector who has not yet been vaccinated, Health Minister Karl Laumann said on Wednesday in Düsseldorf in the health committee of the local state parliament .

“That’s why my aim, together with other state ministers of health, is that if this vaccine is scarce at the beginning, we will first use this vaccine as a priority in the healthcare facilities,” he explained to the deputies.

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According to a survey that has just started and is therefore still incomplete, for which a good half of the facilities have so far submitted data, according to the ministry, around six percent of the nursing staff in NRW are not vaccinated. According to the status, there are around 11,200 unvaccinated people who work in the homes. Accordingly, 3.3 percent of those in need of care were not vaccinated.

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Digitally generated image of Covid-19 vaccine bottle frozen inside ice shape.

The so-called facility-related vaccination obligation, in turn, stipulates that employees in facilities such as medical practices, clinics and nursing homes must prove by March 15 that they have been vaccinated or have recovered. This is intended to better protect patients and those in need of care from corona infection.

Saxony’s secret hope for a solution to the vaccination problem

In Saxony, there are also great hopes for Novavax, especially since you have to deal with a particularly large number of nursing staff who have not yet been vaccinated. In the field of care, up to 15 percent of the staff in Saxony are still unsure whether they want to be vaccinated despite the obligation introduced in mid-March, said Minister of Health Petra Köpping (SPD). on Thursday during a visit to a retirement home in Delitzsch. In medical practices and hospitals it is three to five percent. According to her, many of those affected were deliberately waiting for the Novavax vaccine.

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scientist Florian Krammer

She did not say whether this also means that Novavax will initially be used primarily in this sector. According to earlier information from the minister, only around 65 percent of the approximately 300,000 workers in the medical and nursing sector in Saxony are currently vaccinated against corona.

Köpping campaigned for uniform federal rules in the implementation of compulsory vaccination, which is currently to be implemented by decrees of the federal states. The federal states are currently working on the decrees, the SPD politician continued. We are currently in the process of voting.

Meanwhile, Bavaria’s Minister of Health, Klaus Holetschek, also recommended rethinking the deadlines for an occupational vaccination requirement, as he did the media group RND said. The CSU politician also justified this with the Novavax vaccine. “(…) This protein vaccine (…) can again play a positive role in convincing some people to get vaccinated,” explained Holetschek. In Bavaria, too, Novavax should therefore preferably be available for vaccinations of employees in health and care facilities.

Thuringia speaks of many ambiguities

In Thuringia, too, the distribution of the coveted new vaccine is being considered. The Ministry of Health and the Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians (KV) have already dampened expectations. Vaccination appointments with the new corona vaccine from the US manufacturer Novavax cannot currently be booked in Thuringia, it said on Thursday. There are still too many uncertainties about the expected vaccine quantities and their distribution.

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“As long as we don’t know what we’re getting, we can’t offer appointments at the vaccination centers,” said KV vaccination manager Jörg Mertz. The expected first delivery of the 1.75 million vaccine doses will be distributed to the individual federal states according to the proportion of the population. According to Mertz, this would initially mean around 44,000 cans for Thuringia. Even there, however, it is not yet known where these will be used first – for example, whether hospitals, fire brigades or areas of vital infrastructure will be used first. “As soon as that is certain, we will create offers as soon as possible,” said a spokeswoman for the ministry.

Another federal state has so far planned Novavax distribution without prioritization: In Saarland, bookings for the vaccine from the US manufacturer will be possible from February 5, it said in Saarbrücken. “However, we can only give a specific date for the start of appointment booking and vaccinations with Novavax in the vaccination centers as soon as we have the final delivery commitment and date from Berlin,” said Minister of Health Monika Bachmann (CDU).

The residents of Rhineland-Palatinate could be a little earlier: There, the first registrations for a Novavax vaccination on the vaccination portal of the federal state will be possible from January 24th, according to Health Minister Clemens Hoch (SPD). on the SWR station.

Other states have not yet officially commented on how and when the US protein vaccine will be offered to them.

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Corona and autoimmune disease

The Novavax agent was recently approved as the fifth corona vaccine in the EU. Two doses are injected about three weeks apart. The vaccine is protein-based and therefore not a classic so-called “dead vaccine” in which killed viruses are used. Nevertheless, Novavax is based on a different, alternative technology than the mRNA vaccines from Biontech and Moderna.

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Illustration of a healthcare worker in a protective ward with a surgical mask holding a vial of vaccineI.  Novavax is a new coronavirus vaccine on the market, and Indonesia was the first to approve it.  in Zagreb, Croatia, on November 04, 2021. Photo: Tomislav Miletic/PIXSELL

The effectiveness for protection against symptomatic infections was given by the EU medicines authority EMA at around 90 percent. Experts pointed out that not as much is known about the new vaccine as about the other preparations that have been in widespread use for some time.

Editor’s note: The text has been supplemented and updated with new statements and explanations.

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