On Wednesday, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) authorized updated versions of Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech’s covid booster shots. Moderna was authorized for those 18 and up while the Pfizer modified booster was authorized for ages 12 and up. This move would allow the Biden administration to possibly begin offering boosters around Labor Day, pending further Central for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) endorsement.
The FDA authorization is not the final step, the decision will now go to the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention and its advisory committee to issue their own recommendation about the use of the shots. The agency’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices is scheduled to vote Thursday. The BA.5 omicron variant makes up nearly 90 percent of all new Covid cases in the US, according to the CDC. Announcement of this FDA authorization comes after concerns of the new boosters not having passed through human trial.
The US government agreed to purchase 105 million doses of Pfizer’s vaccine and 66 million doses of Moderna’s vaccine, according to individually released announcements. People who have received the two-dose primary series of either vaccine and those who have received the initial two doses plus one or two boosters are eligible for the updated shots provided that two months have passed since their last shots, the FDA statement said.
It is anticipated that the recommendation will go through and that the boosters will become available to the public, the Biden Administration has signalled for weeks that it expects the fall booster campaign with the new booster shots to begin around labor day. In a press briefing Wednesday, FDA Commissioner Robert Califf emphasized the need for fall boosters, noting that the country is still seeing rising deaths and hospitalizations.
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