As most people recall, the original COVID-19 vaccine recommendation for Americans was for two doses. Then, once that plan’s efficacy wasn’t as good as expected, Americans were told they needed two more boosters.
Some individuals have even begun clearing space for their fifth, sixth, and seventh boosters, and so on.
The FDA wants to use a strategy similar to the flu vaccination through yearly updated doses in order to better focus on its messaging.
NPR says:
The objective is to streamline COVID vaccination and possibly use a strategy akin to that of the influenza vaccine, with yearly modifications to correspond with whichever strain of the virus is prevalent, according to a government official that requested anonymity since they were not permitted to talk in public.
Early on Monday, NPR revealed the proposed change, and later that day, the FDA made it public in a package of documents made available ahead of a session of the agency’s Vaccine Committee on Thursday. The agency’s suggestion will be put to a vote by the committee.
To combat whichever new COVID-19 strain is predominant in the nation, Americans may soon be expected to take a fresh shot in the fall, similar to how they do with the annual flu vaccine.
As can be expected, a lot of medical professionals have already expressed their worries about this new “science.” Not to mention the new FDA vaccination paradigm that the White House will undoubtedly start promoting soon.
John Moore, an immunologist at Weill Cornell Medical College, stated that there is “no reliable data about the effectiveness of the bivalent boosters.”
He continued, “There is a dearth of concrete data, and the evidence that is available is at best ambiguous and, to me, seems to suggest that the bivalent boosters were little to no better.”
According to Dr. Paul Offit of the University of Pennsylvania, “we should not really be pursuing these variants, which have a fast pace of change and are frequently gone by the time you’ve generated the vaccine.”
On Thursday, the Advisory Committee on Vaccines and Related Biological Products will convene to talk about and decide on these potential COVID-19 vaccine alterations.
