Short-Term Drop in Antibody Titer after the Third Dose of SARS-CoV-2 BNT162b2 Vaccine in Adults

Jonas Herzberg; Bastian Fischer; Heiko Becher; Ann-Kristin Becker; Human Honarpisheh; Salman Yousuf Guraya; Tim Strate; Cornelius Knabbe

doi:10.3390/vaccines10050805

Short-Term Drop in Antibody Titer after the Third Dose of SARS-CoV-2 BNT162b2 Vaccine in Adults

Vaccines (Basel). 2022 May 20;10(5):805. doi: 10.3390/vaccines10050805.

Authors

Jonas Herzberg¹, Bastian Fischer², Heiko Becher³, Ann-Kristin Becker⁴, Human Honarpisheh¹, Salman Yousuf Guraya⁵, Tim Strate¹, Cornelius Knabbe²

Affiliations

¹ Department of Surgery, Krankenhaus Reinbek St. Adolf-Stift, 21465 Reinbek, Germany.
² Institut für Laboratoriums-und Transfusionsmedizin, Herz-und Diabeteszentrum Nordrhein-Westfalen, Universitätsklinik der Ruhr-Universität Bochum, 32545 Bad Oeynhausen, Germany.
³ Institute of Medical Biometry and Epidemiology, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf, 20246 Hamburg, Germany.
⁴ Abteilung für Psychiatrie und Psychotherapie, Asklepios Klinik Harburg, 21075 Hamburg, Germany.
⁵ Clinical Sciences Department, College of Medicine, University of Sharjah, Sharjah P.O. Box 27272, United Arab Emirates.

Abstract

Little is known about the longevity of antibodies after a third dose of the mRNA-based SARS-CoV-2 vaccine BNT162b2 (BioNTech/Pfizer, Mainz, Germany). Therefore, serum antibody levels were evaluated after a third dose of BNT162b2 in healthy adult healthcare workers in Germany. These antibody levels dropped significantly within a short period of 11 weeks from 4155.59 ± 2373.65 BAU/mL to 2389.10 ± 1433.90 BAU/mL, p-value < 0.001 but remained higher than after the second dose (611.92 ± 450.31 BAU/mL). To evaluate the quality of the humoral immune response, we additionally measured neutralizing antibodies, which also showed a small but significant decrease within this short period. These data underline the positive effect of a third dose of BNT162b2 concerning antibody re-induction but also shows a drop of Anti-SARS-CoV-2-IgG within a short span of time.

Keywords: BNT162b2; SARS-CoV-2; antibody longevity; humoral immunity; vaccination.

Grants and funding

This research received no external funding.