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There’s a shortage of monkeypox vaccine. Could one dose instead of two suffice?

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  • There’s a shortage of monkeypox vaccine. Could one dose instead of two suffice?

    Studies suggests even a single shot of Bavarian Nordic’s vaccine offers fast protection

    1 JUL 2022

    BY JON COHEN

    As the monkeypox outbreak grows, the preferred vaccine to combat it is in short supply—a problem that’s only getting worse now that countries are expanding access to the vaccine. But there is a strategy that could double overnight the number of people who can be vaccinated: use a single shot instead of the recommended two.

    Compelling data from monkey and human studies suggest a single dose of the vaccine—produced by Bavarian Nordic and sold under three different brand names—solidly protects against monkeypox, and that the second dose mainly serves to extend the durability of protection.

    The United Kingdom, Germany, and Canada are offering the vaccine to anyone deemed at high risk of infection—for now that’s primarily men who have sex with men (MSM) who have multiple partners. The United States at first limited the vaccine to contacts of confirmed cases, including health care workers, but on 28 June also began to offer it to people at high risk of infection who had presumed exposures, which includes MSM who have had multiple partners “in an area where monkeypox is spreading.”

    ... millions of people worldwide are now eligible for the vaccine. Yet there are nowhere near enough doses of vaccine, which contains a virus called modified vaccinia Ankara (MVA), to quickly get all of them the recommended two doses, which are normally spaced 4 weeks apart.



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