During his press conference, the Minister of Health Olivier Véran and Professor Alain Fischer, responsible for coordinating the vaccine strategy, announced that the government would follow the recommendations of Pfizer / BioNTech and not that of the Haute Autorité de Santé , which consists in maintaining the time limit for the administration of the second injection at 21 or 28 days.
The choice of security for France
While the doses of vaccines are running out, those scheduled for February are mainly intended for those who received a first injection in January. In recent days, the question has arisen: should the two injections be spaced out in order to vaccinate more people? “Several experts wonder about spacing out the two doses of the Pfizer vaccine at 6 weeks, or 42 days, against 3 to 4 weeks” explained Olivier Véran, adding that “the interest would be to vaccinate a maximum of fragile people to limit the health impact as soon as possible. It is a legitimate and useful reflection. “
This Tuesday morning, Olivier Véran and Alain Fischer therefore decided at a press conference: France has chosen security, respecting the reminder deadline of 21 days or 28 days, not following the recommendations of the Haute health authority, which had advised to space the two doses of the vaccine at six weeks so that the injections are tolerated. “We are faced with a part of the unknown and I am choosing safety. […] I therefore maintain the time between two Pfizer injections at 21 or 28 days, i.e. 3 to 4 weeks, and ask those in charge of vaccination to stick to this recommendation. We are not touching the injection time of the Pfizer vaccine ”declared the Minister of Health. In addition, he stressed that the longer the deadline, the less likely the people concerned are to go to the appointment to make the callback.
A delay of 21 or 28 days for the second dose
Considered as “Mr. vaccine”, Alain Fischer pointed out, even if the injection is postponed, we “also realize that a few weeks later, at the end of March, at the beginning of April, the number of vaccinated would be the same”. He goes on to say that he has “no information available on the effectiveness over the duration of a first dose. There are some warning signs, data published in Israel shows that in over 65s the protection between the two doses is only 33%, it is a disappointment ”while the percentage was 50% during clinical trials, according to Pfizer. Analyzes on the consequences of a delay of the 2nd dose at 42 days were not carried out, because all the participants in the clinical trials received the second dose at 21 or 28 days: “In clinical trials, few people received the second dose at six weeks. We can imagine that the statistical power is low ”.
