17 March 2021, Wednesday, 12:55 150

Health Ministry Expands Interval Between 1st And 2nd CoviShield Doses From 28 To 90 Days

Редактор: Daria Zubkova

The Health Ministry has expanded the interval between the first and the second doses of the CoviShield vaccine from 28 to 90 days.

The ministry’s press service has said this in a statement, Ukrainian News Agency reports.

It is noted that the discussion of the feasibility of increasing the period began after March 6 in the medical journal The Lancet which had published information on the effectiveness of a single-dose vaccination regimen with the introduction of the second dose 12 weeks later.

Previously, the interim results of four randomized controlled trials conducted in Brazil, South Africa and the United Kingdom, to achieve the greatest health benefits quickly, the UK government adopted a policy of administering as many first doses as possible and delaying the second dose of vaccine 12 weeks after the first dose.

According to Deputy Health Minister / Senior Medical Officer, Viktor Liashko, when analyzing data from clinical trials, the effectiveness of the vaccine after a single standard dose was 76% between the 22nd and the 90th day, and the level of antibodies during this period had a minimal decrease.

As Ukrainian News Agency earlier reported, On March 16, the number of vaccinations with the first dose rose by 10.2% over March 15 to 9,840.

On March 16, only one person was vaccinated with the second dose.

Since the very start of the vaccination campaign, a total of 71,923 people have been vaccinated.

On March 15, the number of vaccinations with the first dose rose 4.4 times over March 14 to 8,928.

On March 16, the number of newly-registered Covid-19 cases in Ukraine rose by 11,933 over March 15 to 1,489,023, and the number of deaths increased by 289 over March 15 to 28,986; at the same time, the number of new cases increased by 22.7%, and the number of new lethal cases increased by 9.5%.

According to the report, as of the morning of March 17, a total of 1,489,023 laboratory-confirmed Covid-19 cases were registered in Ukraine; the number included 28,986 fatal cases; 1,237,676 people had recovered.

On March 16, a total of 11,933 new disease cases were recorded, 289 people died, and 5,467 people recovered.

Therefore, as of March 16, the number of newly-infected people was higher than that of those who recovered (11,933 vs. 5,467).

The number of coronavirus-infected people as of the morning of March 17 was 222,361, up 2.8% over March 16.

Since the start of the epidemic, the largest number of coronavirus-infected people has been registered in the city of Kyiv (148,931), Odesa region (93,875), and Kharkiv region (91,510).