Vaccine expert Dr. Mario Jiz, head of the Immunology Department at the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine (IDRITM), suggests the community need to ‘reimmunize’ every time a certain mutation of the COVID-19 virus variant comes into surface, as discussed in an earlier media forum held by the Department of Health, Tuesday, 18th of January 2022.
Dr. Jiz further shared about how the coronavirus mutations have been taking its toll on one’s immunity, and that looking into the formulation of variant-specific booster vaccines could be the answer to the gradual eradication of the virus itself.
“So kunwari may dumating na variant after six months or one year, we have to check that if the vaccines are working or not, and ang unang tinetest dyan would be the antibodies. Most probably kapag marami ang mutations ng variant na ‘yun, most probably, most of our vaccines will fail kasi nga, remember ang mga vaccines natin ngayon are actually based on the original China strain,” he added.
Even with planning the creation of variant-specific boosters, Dr. Jiz also gave a precaution on the possible ‘immune escape’ or ‘immune evasion’ that allows one’s immunogenic response to fall back even more.
“So kapag sobrang dumami na talaga ang mutation ng ating virus, baka kasi mag-escape na siya, ‘yung tinatawag nating immune escape, so first we have to assess that in the laboratory and see if the serum or antibodies from our vaccinated individuals will still work or no longer work,” he enlightened.
However, given that bringing the plan into life could take a couple more months to potentially a year before its finalization, the vaccine expert rules out how effective and efficient the existing boosters are.
“So kapag sobrang dumami na talaga ang mutation ng ating virus, baka kasi mag-escape na siya, ‘yung tinatawag nating immune escape, so first we have to assess that in the laboratory and see if the serum or antibodies from our vaccinated individuals will still work or not,” ending his statement.
What needs to be prioritized are the elderlies, teens, and those with comorbidities, the same as how they were the first ones inoculated in the first wave of vaccines back in the 4th quarter of 2021, the immunologist entails.
As of January 18, 2022, 4.76 million Filipinos received their booster shots, summing up to an average of 267,900 given daily, about a million more to come to reach the proposed target of the government, about 72.16 million by June 2022.
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