Protection Granted By COVID Vaccines Decline Within Six Months – New Study Emphasizes the Importance of Booster Shots

Protection Granted By COVID Vaccines Decline Within Six Months –  New Study Emphasizes the Importance of Booster Shots
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Although officials around the world believe that getting vaccinated for COVID is a great idea, you know what they say that nothing lasts forever. It may also be the case for the protection granted by coronavirus vaccines. A new study done by UK researchers reveals that the protection declines over time.

Reuters.com reveals that UK researchers found that the protection against COVID offered by two shots of either the vaccine developed by Pfizer or AstraZeneca begins to decline within only six months.

Booster shots are needed

The idea of an extra vaccine shot for COVID was largely debated. The new findings underscore the need for booster shots. Data from over a million app users was used for the study.

Credit: Pixabay.com, torstensimon
Credit: Pixabay.com, torstensimon

The effectiveness of Pfizer’s vaccine when it comes to preventing COVID infection in the month following the second dose fell from 88% to 74% after five to six months. The analysis of data was collected during Britain’s ZOE COVID study.

As for the jab developed by AstraZeneca, the effectiveness fell to 67% from 77% after four to five months.
However, more data is needed for younger people.

Tim Spector, the principal investigator of the new study and ZOE Ltd co-founder, says that under a worst-case scenario, the protection offered by vaccines could fall under 50% for elders and healthcare workers by the winter. He explained for BBC Television as quoted by Reuters.com:

It’s bringing into focus this need for some action. We can’t just sit by and see the protectiveness slowly waning whilst cases are still high and the chance of infection still high as well.

According to Our World in Data, 32.9% of the entire planet’s population has been vaccinated for COVID with at least one dose, while 24.8% of the world is fully vaccinated.


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Even since he was a child, Cristian was staring curiously at the stars, wondering about the Universe and our place in it. Today he's seeing his dream come true by writing about the latest news in astronomy. Cristian is also glad to be covering health and other science topics, having significant experience in writing about such fields.

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