According to the Hunan Provincial Center for Disease Control and Prevention (Hunan CDC), as of February 17, 2022, 130 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines had been administered in Hunan. More than 52 million people have received a full course of vaccination. Following the requirements of the National Health Commission, Hunan will continue to promote COVID-19 vaccinations provincewide. Sequential booster vaccinations will be rolled out, in addition to the homologous booster shots, in a bid to ensure all people eligible for vaccination have access to it, and build province-wide immunity barrier.

Compared with a homologous booster vaccination strategy, sequential immunization can improve the breadth, strength, durability and functionality of immune response. The approach has proved to be safe and effective based on domestic and foreign studies. No additional side effects were found to be linked to a sequential booster.
Sequential immunization is a vaccination strategy that uses different types of vaccines for original and booster inoculations. For example, people who have received a full course of an inactivated vaccine against COVID-19 can get a booster shot of a vaccine from one of several different technical lines.

Those eligible in Hunan can choose between a protein subunit COVID-19 vaccine made by Anhui Zhifei Lingcom Biopharmaceuticals and a viral vector vaccine developed by CanSino Biologics, for a one-dose sequential booster vaccination. Meanwhile, homologous booster strategy is also available.

People who meet the following requirements are eligible for a sequential COVID-19 booster shot:
- Over 18 years old;
- Fully vaccinated with inactivated vaccines produced by Sinovac, Sinopharm Beijing or Sinopharm Wuhan; and,
- At least 6 months have passed since a second dose has been inoculated.

Next, Hunan’s health authorities at all levels will follow the national plan and the provincial CDC requirements to enhance organization and coordination, and roll out COVID-19 sequential booster immunization in an orderly way.

This article is from Hunan Provincial Government www.enghunan.gov.cn.

Translator: Pang Yuehui

Chinese source: hunan.gov.cn