Infliximab users and covid vaccine

[MrsBeau]

Hello all. This update on immune response to both Astrozeneca and Pfizer vaccines for users of infliximab just turned up on my inbox, hope ot helps someone.

Screenshot of page attached and link below.

medscape.com/viewarticle/94...

[Legomum]

Thanks!Prof Chris Whitty mentioned about antibody response in his talk with RSM last week. It can be watched on youtube: youtu.be/4W6-aq8KhNQMy(Not working as expected?) take home message was not to panic too much as those without Covid antibodies may still be protected from severe disease.

It is good news that a significant number of the IBD patients did develop antibodies after their 2nd vaccine in this Uni of Exeter study. I guess the “adapted vaccine schedule” refers to reducing the 12 week gap between 1st and 2nd vaccine in the UK so patients are protected sooner.

I’m on anti-TNF so have been trying to reassure myself that the immune response involves lots of white blood cells at work with B cells making antibodies PLUS T cell responses (“helper cells” and “killer cells” and “suppressor T cells”).

T cells are harder to measure with complex (expensive) assays which is why we’re only hearing about the antibodies researched so far.

There was also a helpful recent talk from Prof Tim Spector (Kings College London / Zoe Covid app), Ellie Barnes at Oxford and others which mentioned the immunosuppressed. They said Oxford recruited for the OCTAVE study across 5 UK sites looking at 3 vaccines and measuring T cell responses and antibody responses. I am sure those results will be v helpful for immunosuppressed Behçet’s patients in future as we’ll probably need annual jabs like the flu.