Additional Relevant Details
In the pre-clinical study, researchers first immunized Syrian golden hamsters with a single injection of the Ad26-based SARS-CoV-2 vaccine, which induced neutralizing antibodies in all the vaccinated animals. Four weeks later, the animals were exposed to a high dose of SARS-CoV-2 virus. These vaccinated animals lost less weight and had less virus in their lungs and other organs than unvaccinated control animals. Mortalities were absent in vaccinated animals. Moreover, the researchers found that neutralizing antibody responses were inversely correlated with weight loss and viral replication in the lung.Ad26.COV2.S is currently being evaluated in clinical studies to establish the performance of the vaccine candidate in humans.