Study to Evaluate the Immunogenicity and Safety of Heterologous SARS-CoV-2 Vaccine Schemes

The Covid-19 disease caused by the SARS-COV 2 virus has caused a pandemic with more than 180 million cases worldwide and more than 4 million deaths. In Argentina, this pandemic has had a significant impact, with about 4.5 million cases and about 95,000 deaths. In no more than nine months, medical science developed different vaccines to prevent new cases and mitigate this pandemic.

At the time of the presentation of this research protocol, there are four vaccines for the prevention of COVID-19 approved for emergency use by the National Administration of Medicines, Food and Medical Technology (ANMAT). Of these, three (1-3) are currently available and are part of the vaccination campaign. Of these three vaccines, two use a non-replicating viral vector platform (Gam-COVID-Vac and ChAdOx1 nCoV-19) while one uses an inactivated virus platform (BBIBP-CorV). All require the administration of two doses with an administration interval of at least 21 days.

All these vaccines were designed to be used with a homologous two-dose regimen. However, for both logistical and biomedical reasons, the need to use vaccines in heterologous regimens (one dose of one vaccine and a second dose of another vaccine) is emerging worldwide. The efficacy and safety of this type of regimen has not yet been demonstrated.

In Argentina, there are a large number of people who currently have one dose of Gam-COVID-Vac vaccine and who - even after a period of ≥21 days - have not received the second component. At the same time, the provision of the second component of the Gam-COVID-Vac vaccine is delayed due to production and distribution logistics.

As of June 2021, among the universe of people vaccinated with Gam-COVID, residents of CABA, vaccinated in establishments in the City of Buenos Aires - and excluding deceased and infected people - there were a total of 325,788 people with one dose and ≥22 and ≤90 days since the first dose was administered. In a context of high viral circulation, it is desirable to try to vaccinate as much of the population as possible with a full schedule in the shortest possible time. In addition, new variants of SARS-COV2 virus possessing the E384K genomic variant such as the gamma strain (formerly Manaus), the beta strain (known as South African) and the Delta strain (also known as Indian) have the ability to evade the immune system and therefore most laboratories that have developed vaccines recognise that the efficacy of the vaccines requires two doses.

The use of heterologous schedules is a source of active research in various parts of the world (4-6). However, most of this research is testing the combination of a combination schedule that includes an mRNA vaccine. There is an ongoing study sponsored by the Gamaleya Institute and AstraZeneca that is evaluating the immunogenicity of a scheme similar to the one proposed in this trial. Results from this joint trial would not be available until mid-October (7). No trials have evaluated the combination of rAd26-rAd5 and BBIBP-CorV.

This study will attempt to determine whether administration of a heterologous regimen combining a first dose of Gam-COVID-Vac with a second dose of ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 or BBIBP-CorV results in non-inferior immunogenicity to the homologous regimen used.

The present protocol is therefore oriented to respond to a practical management need and to guarantee the best possible protection to the population through two doses, which is what is considered worldwide as "complete vaccination" according to WHO for the vaccines used by Argentina. The proposed protocol is a pragmatic and public health oriented clinical trial, whose primary objective is to establish whether there are indicators that allow the implementation of a heterologous vaccination scheme. For this, a surrogate endpoint will be used, which is immunogenicity measured by the presence of antibodies against protein S. In addition, the safety of the combination will be evaluated in terms of monitoring self-reported and non-self-reported clinical events by patients.