ASH 2021 | Antibody responses to COVID-19 vaccines in patients with hematological malignancies

Patients with hematological malignancies have been disproportionately affected by the COVID-19 pandemic and Susanne Saussele, University of Heidelberg, Mannheim, Germany, provides an overview of the antibody responses to COVID-19 vaccines in patients with hematological diseases. 175 patients who were vaccinated with BNT162b2, mRNA-1273, or ChADOx1 were enrolled in the prospective, observational single-center study. 70.1% of patients were on active therapy, whereas 29.1% of patients were previously treated or treatment naïve. 61.7% of the cohort had a myeloid neoplasm, 21.1% were diagnosed with lymphoid neoplasms, and 17.1% were diagnosed with a non-malignant hematological disease. Antibody levels were tested two weeks after vaccination and 84.6% of the cohort obtained a positive (≥0.8 U/mL) vaccination-related antibody response. Out of the patients who reported a negative response, 77.8% were undergoing active therapy, and 59.3% of patients had lymphoid neoplasms, where patients with low-grade non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) including chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) formed a majority of patients with a negative antibody response. Overall, patients with certain hematological malignancies such CLL had poor immune responses to the COVID-19 vaccine and further research is required to evaluate the risk of further infection after full infection, efficacy of booster vaccinations, as well as the correlation between specific therapies and immune response. This press briefing was recorded at the American Society of Hematology (ASH) 2021 Annual Meeting and Exposition in Atlanta, GA.