Ben Ahmed Melika, Bellali Hedia, Gdoura Mariem, Zamali Imen, Kallala Ouafa, Ben Hmid Ahlem, Hamdi Walid, Ayari Hela, Fares Hajer, Mechri Karim, Marzouki Soumaya, Triki Henda, Ben Alaya Nissaf, Chahed Mohamed Kouni, Klouz Anis, Sebai Ben Amor Sonia, Ben Rayana Chiheb, Razgallah Khrouf Myriam, Hamouda Chokri, Elkadri Noomene, Daghfous Riadh, Trabelsi Abdelhalim
Laboratory of Clinical Immunology, Pasteur Institute of Tunis, Tunis 1002, Tunisia.
Faculty of Medicine of Tunis, Tunis El Manar University, Tunis 1068, Tunisia.
Vaccines (Basel). 2022 Jul 27;10(8):1189. doi: 10.3390/vaccines10081189.
The mass vaccination campaign against SARS-CoV-2 was started in Tunisia on 13 March 2021 by using progressively seven different vaccines approved for emergency use. Herein, we aimed to evaluate the humoral and cellular immunity in subjects aged 40 years and over who received one of the following two-dose regimen vaccines against SARS-CoV-2, namely mRNA-1273 or Spikevax (Moderna), BNT162B2 or Comirnaty (Pfizer-BioNTech), Gam-COVID-Vac or Sputnik V (Gamaleya Research Institute), ChAdOx1-S or Vaxzevria (AstraZeneca), BIBP (Sinopharm), and Coronavac (Sinovac).
For each type of vaccine, a sample of subjects aged 40 and over was randomly selected from the national platform for monitoring COVID-19 vaccination and contacted to participate to this study. All consenting participants were sampled for peripheral blood at 3-7 weeks after the second vaccine dose to perform anti-S and anti-N serology by the Elecsys (Lenexa, KS, USA) anti-SARS-CoV-2 assays (Roche Basel, Switzerland). The CD4 and CD8 T cell responses were evaluated by the QuantiFERON SARS-CoV-2 (Qiagen Basel, Switzerland) for a randomly selected sub-group.
A total of 501 people consented to the study and, of them, 133 were included for the cellular response investigations. Both humoral and cellular immune responses against SARS-CoV-2 antigens differed significantly between all tested groups. RNA vaccines induced the highest levels of humoral and cellular anti-S responses followed by adenovirus vaccines and then by inactivated vaccines. Vaccines from the same platform induced similar levels of specific anti-S immune responses except in the case of the Sputnik V and the AstraZeneca vaccine, which exhibited contrasting effects on humoral and cellular responses. When analyses were performed in subjects with negative anti-N antibodies, results were similar to those obtained within the total cohort, except for the Moderna vaccine, which gave a better cellular immune response than the Pfizer vaccine and RNA vaccines, which induced similar cellular immune responses to those of adenovirus vaccines.
Collectively, our data confirmed the superiority of the RNA-based COVID-19 vaccines, in particular that of Moderna, for both humoral and cellular immunogenicity. Our results comparing between different vaccine platforms in a similar population are of great importance since they may help decision makers to adopt the best strategy for further national vaccination programs.
2021年3月13日，突尼斯启动了针对严重急性呼吸综合征冠状病毒2（SARS-CoV-2）的大规模疫苗接种运动，逐步使用七种不同的紧急使用授权疫苗。在此，我们旨在评估40岁及以上接种以下两种SARS-CoV-2两剂次疫苗方案之一的受试者的体液免疫和细胞免疫，这两种疫苗方案分别为mRNA-1273或Spikevax（莫德纳）、BNT162B2或Comirnaty（辉瑞-BioNTech）、Gam-COVID-Vac或Sputnik V（加马列亚研究所）、ChAdOx1-S或Vaxzevria（阿斯利康）、BIBP（国药集团）和CoronaVac（科兴）。
对于每种疫苗类型，从国家COVID-19疫苗接种监测平台中随机抽取40岁及以上的受试者样本，并联系他们参与本研究。所有同意参与的受试者在第二剂疫苗接种后3至7周采集外周血样本，通过Elecsys（美国堪萨斯州莱内克萨）抗SARS-CoV-2检测（瑞士巴塞尔罗氏公司）进行抗S和抗N血清学检测。通过QuantiFERON SARS-CoV-2（瑞士巴塞尔Qiagen公司）对随机抽取的亚组评估CD4和CD8 T细胞反应。
共有501人同意参与本研究，其中133人纳入细胞反应研究。所有测试组之间针对SARS-CoV-2抗原的体液免疫和细胞免疫反应均存在显著差异。RNA疫苗诱导的体液和细胞抗S反应水平最高，其次是腺病毒疫苗，然后是灭活疫苗。来自同一平台的疫苗诱导的特异性抗S免疫反应水平相似，但Sputnik V和阿斯利康疫苗除外，它们在体液和细胞反应方面表现出相反的效果。在抗N抗体阴性的受试者中进行分析时，结果与整个队列中的结果相似，但莫德纳疫苗除外，其细胞免疫反应优于辉瑞疫苗，而RNA疫苗诱导的细胞免疫反应与腺病毒疫苗相似。
总体而言，我们的数据证实了基于RNA的COVID-19疫苗在体液和细胞免疫原性方面的优越性，尤其是莫德纳疫苗。我们在相似人群中比较不同疫苗平台的结果非常重要，因为它们可能有助于决策者为进一步的国家疫苗接种计划采用最佳策略。
