A study reported in the Journal of the American Medical Association showed that the antibody levels among people who had not had COVID-19 before being given two doses of the Moderna vaccine were twice that of a similar group that had been given the Pfizer/BioNTech shot.
The study included nearly 2,500 employees of a Belgium hospital system. In it, researchers found those who had the Moderna vaccine averaged 2,881 units of antibodies per milliliter, compared with 1,108 units/mL in an equivalent group who had been fully vaccinated with the Pfizer shot.
Neither of the groups had been infected with COVID-19 prior to getting the vaccines.
In addition, the study showed that those who had had the COVID-19 infection and then had been given the Moderna vaccine had a higher number of antibodies than those who had had COVID-19 and then gotten the Pfizer vaccine.
Antibodies are substances our bodies produce to help fight disease.
According to the study, the difference in the levels of antibodies could be a result of the longer interval between shots for Moderna’s vaccine, which is 28 days compared to Pfizer’s 21 days, as well as Moderna’s higher concentration of the active ingredient used in both vaccines.
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