Coronavirus vaccines may reduce risk of long Covid, ONS study finds

According to research by the Office for National Statistics, vaccinations could reduce the risk of long Covid.

The study found that people who were double-vaccinated had a lower likelihood of reporting Covid symptoms.

The double-vaccinated group reported experiencing long Covid at a higher rate than the unvaccinated group.

David Strain, a clinical senior lecturer at the University of Exeter medical school and the British Medical Association's lead on long Covid, said the ONS findings fitted with research published this week that showed low levels of certain antibodies were more common in those who developed long Covid.

He said that if you approach a Covid infection with higher levels of these immunoglobulins it is less likely to become long Covid.

The double-vaccinated participants were more likely to be found to have the vaccine than the unvaccinated group. The results could have been influenced by changes in dominant Covid variant in circulation and other factors.

The study could not prove that vaccination caused the different rates of illness because it was observational and there were other differences between the two groups.

The rate of death involving Covid was five times greater for the Bangladeshi group than for the white British group, and 4.5 times greater for the females, according to the ONS.

In most cases, the rates were explained by where people lived. After adjusting for these factors, the Bangladeshi group and Pakistani men remained at higher risk than average. This group is more likely to be at higher risk from Covid due to the fact that this gene is more common in South Asian populations.

The risk of Covid-19 death in most ethnic minority groups has remained the same since the vaccine programme began. For the first time, we show that the lower vaccination coverage in some ethnic groups contributes to the elevated risk of Covid-19 death, particularly in the black African and black Caribbean groups.