Anders Tegnell: No need for a third syringe

The Public Health Agency announced August 3 that it may be appropriate in the fall for people in risk groups, and that most adults probably will offered a third dose in 2022. Today, the state epidemiologist Anders Tegnel

doubt that a third syringe is the right way to use the vaccine .

- So far, no one knows if a third syringe is needed now.

According to the European Agency for Communicable Disease Control, ECDC, there is no indication, except possibly in Israel, that there is a need for a third dose.

In Sweden, we do not see any increase in the proportion who become infected despite being vaccinated.

Those cases are constantly at a very low level, says Tegnell to Dagens Nyheter.

However, the vaccine protection against covid-19 must be strengthened by another syringe later on, just like other vaccines against seasonal flu must be renewed.

WHO: Stop booster doses

The debate over giving a third dose of covid-19 vaccine to already fully vaccinated people is being waged in several parts of the world.

In July, Israel became the first in the world to offer a third dose of vaccine against covid-19, and in the United States a third dose is planned from mid-September - initially to people in nursing homes and to medical staff, reports the New York Times.

At the same time, the World Health Organization (WHO) has completely opposed the United States, and criticized countries that are now investing in booster doses.

- I call for a temporary moratorium (stop) on booster doses.

Instead, vaccines should be shifted to poor countries.

In low-income countries, only two percent have been vaccinated.

Healthcare staff and vulnerable groups have not even been vaccinated.

"It is not in countries 'best interest to focus on their own national interests now," said WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus at a press conference in Geneva, which also questioned vaccine companies' data on the benefits and safety of dosages, which he said were unclear.

Anders Tegnell is on the same track:

- For me it is quite incomprehensible.

British data and data from other countries do not speak for a third dose.

That it is nevertheless so high on the agenda is a little difficult to understand.

It is much more important to vaccinate those we have not yet reached.

Such a syringe makes a very big difference, he tells DN.

The text is updated.