The Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) yesterday said the nation could next month start importing a next-generation bivalent COVID-19 vaccine approved by the UK on Monday, but it was still considering other factors.
The bivalent vaccine is an updated version of the COVID-19 vaccine made by Moderna, targeting two SARS-CoV-2 variants.
Approved by the UK Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency on Monday, it is to be used as booster shots for adults.
Photo: CNA
In each dose of the bivalent booster vaccine, half of the vaccine (25 micrograms) targets the original virus strain from 2020 and the other half targets the Omicron strain, a news release by the British government said.
Asked if Taiwan would approve and purchase the bivalent vaccine, Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Deputy Director-General Chuang Jen-hsiang (莊人祥), who is the CECC spokesperson, said the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has received data for review.
The new vaccine was developed to target the original strain and the Omicron BA.1 variant of SARS-CoV-2, and Moderna has also sent documents about the vaccine to Taiwan for review, he told the CECC’s regular news conference.
If it is approved by the FDA, the nation might start importing the vaccine in the middle of next month at the earliest, he added.
However, the bivalent vaccine has not yet gained approval in the US, as Washington has asked for vaccines that target the new Omicron subvariants BA.4 and BA.5, so local experts are still discussing whether the nation should purchase the current bivalent vaccine or wait for a newer one targeting BA.5, he said.
Chuang also reported 22,902 new local COVID-19 infections, 270 imported cases and 16 deaths.
The local caseload is 2.4 percent lower than that on Tuesday last week, and the death toll is the lowest in 97 days, he added.
Asked about a comment by National Taiwan University Children’s Hospital superintendent Huang Li-min (黃立民) that the spread of BA.5 in Taiwan might cause the daily caseload to surpass the peak of the BA.2 outbreak, Chuang said the local BA.2 outbreak in late May peaked at more than 90,000 new cases per day.
The CECC predicts that a surge in BA.5 infections could bring the daily caseload to a maximum of about 50,000 to 60,000, as the recent wave of BA.5 infections in other countries has led to daily caseloads that are only about half of the previous BA.1 or BA.2 peak caseloads, with Japan being an exception, posting a record-breaking number of cases, he said.
CDC Deputy Director-General Philip Lo (羅一鈞), deputy head of the CECC’s medical response division, said based on observations in other countries, the BA.5 subvariant is about 20 to 30 percent more infectious than BA.2, but the rates of hospitalization and severe illnesses seem similar to those of BA.1 or BA.2.
The symptoms of BA.5 cases are also similar to previous Omicron infections, including coughing, runny nose, sore throat, fever, headache, fatigue and other cold-like symptoms, he said.
Asked about some patients having recurring COVID-19 symptoms after taking antiviral drugs, Lo said about 1 to 2 percent of confirmed cases experience a relapse in one or two weeks after taking the medication, but the symptoms were usually benign and went away on their own.
He said that people who have a relapse usually do no need to take another course of antivirals, nor will they be put under home isolation again, but they are advised to take precautionary measures after completing the seven-day isolation, as sometimes their viral load might still be high enough to be infectious.
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