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. 2021 Aug 24;36(8):109570.
doi: 10.1016/j.celrep.2021.109570. Epub 2021 Aug 4.

Differential effects of the second SARS-CoV-2 mRNA vaccine dose on T cell immunity in naive and COVID-19 recovered individuals

Daniel Lozano-Ojalvo  1 , Carmen Camara  2 , Eduardo Lopez-Granados  3 , Pilar Nozal  4 , Lucía Del Pino-Molina  3 , Luz Yadira Bravo-Gallego  3 , Estela Paz-Artal  5 , Marjorie Pion  6 , Rafael Correa-Rocha  6 , Alberto Ortiz  7 , Marcos Lopez-Hoyos  8 , Marta Erro Iribarren  9 , Jose Portoles  10 , Maria Pilar Rojo-Portoles  11 , Gloria Ojeda  12 , Isabel Cervera  12 , Maria Gonzalez-Perez  12 , Irene Bodega-Mayor  12 , Maria Montes-Casado  12 , Pilar Portoles  13 , Mayte Perez-Olmeda  12 , Jesus Oteo  12 , Rodrigo Sanchez-Tarjuelo  14 , Venu Pothula  15 , Megan Schwarz  15 , Manisha Brahmachary  15 , Anthony Tanoto Tan  16 , Nina Le Bert  16 , Cecilia Berin  17 , Antonio Bertoletti  16 , Ernesto Guccione  18 , Jordi Ochando  19
Affiliations

Differential effects of the second SARS-CoV-2 mRNA vaccine dose on T cell immunity in naive and COVID-19 recovered individuals

Daniel Lozano-Ojalvo et al. Cell Rep. .

Abstract

The rapid development of mRNA-based vaccines against the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) led to the design of accelerated vaccination schedules that have been extremely effective in naive individuals. While a two-dose immunization regimen with the BNT162b2 vaccine has been demonstrated to provide a 95% efficacy in naive individuals, the effects of the second vaccine dose in individuals who have previously recovered from natural SARS-CoV-2 infection has not been investigated in detail. In this study, we characterize SARS-CoV-2 spike-specific humoral and cellular immunity in naive and previously infected individuals during and after two doses of BNT162b2 vaccination. Our results demonstrate that, while the second dose increases both the humoral and cellular immunity in naive individuals, COVID-19 recovered individuals reach their peak of immunity after the first dose. These results suggests that a second dose, according to the current standard regimen of vaccination, may be not necessary in individuals previously infected with SARS-CoV-2.

Keywords: BNT162b2 vaccine; COVID-19; SARS-CoV-2; T-cell immunity.

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Conflict of interest statement

Declaration of interests A.B. declares the filing of a patent application relating to the use of peptide pools in whole blood for detection of SARS-CoV-2 T cells (pending). The remaining authors declare no competing interests.

Figures

None
Graphical abstract
Figure 1
Figure 1
Development of humoral and cellular immunity after BNT162b2 vaccination (A and B) Quantification of IFN-γ (Α) and IL-2 production (B) in naive and COVID-19 recovered individuals (pre-vaccination [pre], 10 and 20 days after the first vaccine dose [10 and 20, respectively], and 10 and 20 days after the second vaccine dose [30 and 40, respectively]) after overnight stimulation of whole blood with SARS-CoV-2 peptide pools. IFN-γ and IL-2 concentration levels were determined using ELLA single plex cartridges (n = 92 individuals; 47 naive and 45 COVID-19 recovered). (C) Kinetics of SARS-CoV-2 spike-specific IgG serum levels in naive and COVID-19 recovered individuals measured by ACCESS SARS-CoV-2 CLIA. For IgG, IFN-γ, and IL-2 determination, the group means method was used to compare pre-treatment versus post-treatment time points and also among post-treatment time points. All individual time points were measured using technical triplicates. A two-sample t test assuming unpaired populations for pre- and post-treatment was performed for each of the markers, separately for the COVID-19 recovered and naive cohorts. The p value for the test statistic was set to the 0.05 level of significance, and the Benjamini-Hochberg (BH) method was used for multiple testing correction.
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