Which vaccination strategy against COVID-19?

Abstract

Background: Bottlenecks in the production and supply pipeline of vaccines against coronavirus disease 2019 have led some countries to consider the option of dose-sparing strategies (e.g., increasing the number of people who receive some vaccine by halving the dose or increasing the interval between doses). In this study we assess the contribution of vaccination strategies to reducing the mortality induced by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2. Methods: This study focuses on the evolution of the pandemic and related vaccination efforts in five countries that have adopted different vaccination strategies or have experienced a bottleneck in their vaccine supply. The analysis is conducted using an autoregressive time-series approach through a system of simultaneous equations. Results: The outcome of the early months of the vaccination campaign in containing the number of deaths induced by the epidemic varies across our sample. Overall, our results highlight the effective role played by the vaccine in containing the death toll induced by the epidemic. We could not find evidence of reduced effectiveness of the second dose in the presence of an extended inter-dose interval. The effectiveness of the vaccination campaign results appears to be strongly affected by the stability of vaccine supply. Conclusions: The vaccine is effective in containing the deaths caused by the virus, particularly when multiple doses have been administered. The stability of the vaccine pipeline plays a critical role in determining the effectiveness of the vaccination campaign.