File photo taken on November 23, 2020 shows a bottle reading “Vaccine COVID-19” and a syringe next to the Pfizer and BioNtech logos. – An expert committee convened by the US Food and Drug Administration on December 10, 2020, voted heavily in favor of recommending the Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine for emergency use approval. (Photo by JOEL SAGET / AFP)
JERUSALEM – Israel’s health ministry said Saturday recent data from its aggressive coronavirus vaccination campaign showed two doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech jab were nearly 96 percent effective against infection.
Israel’s inoculation campaign is regarded as the world’s fastest, with one dose of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine administered to 4.25 million people out of its nine million-strong population since December, according to the latest health ministry figures.
Some 2.88 million people have received the recommended full course of two jabs.
The health ministry said on Saturday the vaccine had proved 95.8 percent effective in preventing coronavirus infection among those vaccinated two weeks after receiving their second shot compared to unvaccinated people, according to data compiled up to February 13.
It added the jab was 99.2 percent effective against serious illness and 98.9 percent effective in preventing death.
For those tested one week after receiving a second jab, the vaccine was 91.9 percent effective against infection, 96.4 percent effective in preventing serious illness and 94.5 percent in preventing death.
“Our goal is to continue vaccinating all our population aged 16 and up, to reach a wide coverage of the population that will enable us to return to our much missed routines,” health ministry director general Hezi Levi said in a statement Saturday.
The jab developed by US pharma giant Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech is based on novel mRNA technology and was the first vaccine against Covid-19 to be approved in the West late last year.
Israel, which has one of the world’s most sophisticated medical data systems, secured a substantial stock of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine by paying above market price and by striking a data-sharing deal with the US company.