Antibody response to SARS‐CoV‐2 messenger RNA vaccines in liver transplant recipients

Strauss, Alexandra T.; Hallett, Andrew M.; Boyarsky, Brian J.; Ou, Michael T.; Werbel, William A.; Avery, Robin K.; Tobian, Aaron A. R.; Massie, Allan B.; Hamilton, James P.A.; Garonzik‐Wang, Jacqueline M.; Segev, Dorry L.

Prior studies have demonstrated a decreased humoral response in solid organ transplant recipients (SOTRs) to SARS‐CoV‐2 mRNA vaccination (17% antibody response after dose 1, 54% after dose 2) as compared to the general population (100%). However, these studies were dominated by kidney transplant recipients, and included only a small percentage of liver transplant (LT) recipients (19.6%).(1–4) Since LT recipients often receive milder induction and maintenance immunosuppression, they may have a more robust humoral response. To investigate this, we studied SARS‐CoV‐2 antibody development in a cohort of LT recipients who completed a two‐dose mRNA vaccine series of either mRNA‐1273 (Moderna) or BNT162b2 (Pfizer‐BioNTech).