Association Between the Effectiveness and Immunogenicity of Inactivated SARS-CoV2 Vaccine (CoronaVac) with the Presence of Hypertension among Health Care Workers

Abstract

ABSTRACT Objective: This study aimed to observe the association between the presence of hypertension with Covid-19 vaccine effectiveness among healthcare workers who received CoronaVac vaccination. Methods: We conducted a prospective cohort study in Saiful Anwar General Hospital, Malang, Indonesia on 155 healthcare workers aged 18–59 years old who already received twice of the CoronaVac (Sinovac Life Science, Beijing, China) injection with 14-day intervals. Hypertension was diagnosed according to the 2020 International Society of Hypertension. Subjects were monitored for six months. The primary outcome was the rate of Covid-19 diagnosed by the pharyngeal swab for the real-time reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) examination. The secondary endpoints were: (1) severity of Covid-19 among infected participants; (2) rate of hospitalizations; and (3) anti-SRBD antibody levels measured by ECLIA. Results: Among 155 participants, 18.7% of them were diagnosed with hypertension, and 31.0% had the desirable BP target according to the current guidelines. Subjects with hypertension, especially those with uncontrolled blood pressure, had a higher incidence of Covid-19 infection than subjects without hypertension. Subjects with symptomatic Covid-19 and hospitalized because of Covid-19 were higher in participants with hypertension. The anti-SRBD antibody levels were lower in the second month after CoronaVac vaccination in hypertensive subjects. In contrast, comparable anti-SRBD levels were seen from both groups at sixth months after vaccination. Conclusion: Hypertension was associated with lower vaccine effectiveness in healthcare workers. Subjects with hypertension had a higher risk of being infected with Covid-19 despite getting a complete dose of vaccination and lower antibody production.