COVID-19 Vaccine Effectiveness, Responses and Safety (COVERS) Sweden: Clinical and epidemiological studies with special focus on vulnerable groups

Our interdisciplinary project COVERS Sweden will study how COVID-19 immunity develops over time in order to inform policy about e.g., risks for local outbreaks, appropriate intervals for continued vaccinations and target groups for vaccination campaigns.

We will also develop sustainable infrastructures for real-time disease surveillance, geographically independent home sampling for quantitative serology, digital consents for study participation, and tools to increase biobank availability.

We combine expertise in epidemiology, immunology and infectious disease control in three work packages to study vaccine uptake and effectiveness, assess the safety of the new COVID-19 vaccines, and identify attitudes and user-experiences that influence efficacy of vaccination campaigns and implementation of new infrastructures.

Epidemiological surveillance is combined with immunological methodology to reveal longevity of vaccine-induced responses and susceptibility to infection or side effects with respect to prior COVID-19 infection, sex, age, type of residence (e.g., older people living in special homes), country of birth, socioeconomic dimensions, medical conditions, and geographical areas.

Through the Senior Alert register infrastructure, we will reach the most vulnerable elderly population at special homes, and by implementation of easy-to-use high quality home sampling, we remove logistical and structural hurdles to reach geographically and socially challenging areas.