On Jun. 28, 2021, the University of Oxford in partnership with AstraZeneca began vaccinations for a new phase in human trials to test a COVID-19 vaccine ‘AZD2816’ in volunteers against the B.1.351 variant of concern – commonly known as the Beta variant. The Phase II/III trial, sponsored and led by AstraZeneca will recruit approximately 2,250 participants across UK, South Africa, Brazil and Poland.

AZD2816 will be administered to individuals who have previously been fully vaccinated with two doses of the original Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine or an mRNA vaccine, at least three months after their last injection. In non-vaccinated individuals, AZD2816 will be given as two doses, four or twelve weeks apart, or given as a second dose following a first dose of original Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine four weeks apart.

For the UK booster study launch participants must have received two doses of an approved COVID-19 vaccine three to 12 weeks apart more than three months prior to the study. The new vaccine, known as AZD2816 has been designed using the same adenoviral vector platform developed by researchers at the University of Oxford using the ChAdOx platform technology, with minor genetic alterations to the spike protein based on the Beta (B.1.351, South African) variant.