2021/12/21
Keio University School of Medicine
Vaccinations are progressing worldwide with the aim of ending the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. In Japan, vaccines from Pfizer, Moderna, and AstraZeneca have been approved, and vaccinations with the Pfizer vaccine, followed by the Moderna and AstraZeneca vaccines, are being administered. While several studies have been published in Japan on the effectiveness and adverse reactions of the Pfizer vaccine, there are few large-scale studies that have comprehensively evaluated the effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines. In particular, research is limited on the effectiveness and adverse reactions in the Japanese population who received the Moderna vaccine, which was introduced later and used mainly for workplace vaccinations.
Therefore, with the support of the Japan Agency for Medical Research and Development (AMED), we will conduct a large-scale clinical study to evaluate the acquisition rate of humoral immunity (immunity by antibodies, etc.) and cellular immunity (immunity by immune cells) against the novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) through vaccination with the Moderna vaccine, the incidence of adverse reactions, and the relationship between adverse reactions and immune acquisition. The study will survey 3,000 Keio University students, faculty, and staff who received the Moderna vaccine through the university's workplace vaccination program, investigating their COVID-19 antibody titers, cellular immunity, and the incidence of adverse reactions.
This study is expected to clarify the extent to which individuals who received the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine through workplace vaccinations have acquired and currently possess immunity, as well as the incidence of adverse reactions. Furthermore, the findings and specimens obtained from this research are considered to have significant public health benefits for Japan's future infectious disease control measures and vaccine strategies. Through collaboration with REBIND (the national repository of the Japan Program for Infectious Diseases Research and Infrastructure), we aim to widely return the results of this study to society.
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