The U.S. announced plans Aug. 18 to offer booster shots of Pfizer and Moderna's COVID-19 vaccines starting Sept. 20 to all Americans who received two doses of the shots eight months prior. Since then, some medical experts have criticized the decision, saying the focus should be on vaccinating as many people across the globe as possible.
Five updates on the U.S. plan to administer COVID-19 booster shots:
- The U.S. will likely offer booster shots for fully vaccinated Americans six months after their last COVID-19 vaccine was administered, instead of the eight-month gap that was previously announced, a source familiar with the matter told The Wall Street Journal.
- Johnson & Johnson said a second dose of its COVID-19 vaccine given six to eight months after the first shot resulted in antibody levels that were nine times higher than 28 days after the initial vaccination.
- A third dose of Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine could significantly improve immunity against the virus in people ages 60 and older, a real-world study in Israel suggested. There, a third dose reduced the risk of infection in the age group by 86 percent and reduced the risk of severe disease by 92 percent.
- Many epidemiological experts have been critical of the U.S. decision to lay out its booster plan before releasing data on booster shots' effectiveness or announcing FDA approval for booster use in Americans who are not immunocompromised.
"I have not seen robust data yet to suggest that it is better to boost Americans who have gotten two vaccines than invest resources and time in getting unvaccinated people across the world vaccinated," Joshua Barocas, MD, a professor of medicine at Boulder-based University of Colorado, told Kaiser Health News. - The CDC delayed an advisory panel meeting to discuss booster shots for the general population by one week, moving it from Aug. 24 to a two-day meeting starting Aug. 30.