SURVEY OF THE SHORT-TERM SAFETY OF THE VERO CELL COVID-19 VACCINE AMONG CHINESE CITIZENS IN LESOTHO

Abstract

Emergency authorization was granted to administer a Vero Cell inactivated coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) vaccine to Chinese citizens living in Lesotho from August 2021 to December 2021.  We aimed to determine the safety of this vaccine in order to inform efforts to improve uptake of this vaccine.  The inclusion criteria for study subjects were: being a Chinese citizen, willing to participate in this study, being aged ≥18 years, having no history of COVID-19 during the previous 6 months and having received 2 doses the study vaccine 28 days apart.  Adverse reactions were assessed at 30 minutes and 7 days (by phone) after the first dose of the vaccine, and at 7, 30, 60, and 90 days after the second dose of the vaccine (by phone).  A total of 1,289 subjects were included in the study, 828 (64.2%) males.  211 subjects (16.4%) reported an adverse reaction to the vaccine.  Fatigue was the most common adverse reaction (n = 58, 4.5%), followed by pain at the injection site (n = 49, 3.8%), drowsiness (n = 34, 2.6%), dizziness (n = 23, 1.8%,) and headache (n = 15, 1.2%).  The following adverse reactions were reported by <1.0% of subjects for each symptom: myalgia, diarrhea, fever, anorexia, arthralgia, induration of the injection site, erythema of the injection site, rash at the injection site, edema of the injection site, pruritis of the injection site and emesis.  No severe adverse reactions were reported.  In summary, the Vero cell-inactivated vaccine resulted in only mild adverse reactions among the Chinese study subjects in Lesotho.  We conclude the vaccine is safe and Chinese in Lesotho should be educated about this safety profile in hopes of improving uptake of this vaccine in this patient population.  Further studies are needed to determine if educating this population about this safety profile may improve the vaccine uptake.