Exactly. I know of three folks who are 65+, whose doc suggested that they get a third jab. They are not immunocompromised, and had no issues when they presented to a pharmacy: ‘my doc recommended that I get a third jab.’ ‘Ok, roll up your sleeve.’
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My doc recommended a dose a few weeks ago for me, due to conditions and prednisone between other two shots. However, I am waiting. The Atlantic covers a few possible reasons not to rush: When You Should Get Your COVID Booster Shot - The Atlantic
You might want to make sure not to interfere with the longer term development of B and T cells (antibodies naturally wane). One person in the article says 6 months is okay, 8 months better, maybe even 12
And it might be prudent to time the third jab so that maximum effectiveness coincides with events important to you etc. In that regard, older people take longer than younger so older people should get the shot further back from the wedding, holiday, travel or whatever.
the article in The Atlantic gives a “few [speculative] reasons not to rush…” The point is that no one knows which is good/better/best: stronger antibodies (get jabbed now) or B and T-cells (8 months).
Right noone knows. Editing my post. I was citing opinion in the article, not fact.
I read recently that the FDA committee vote on boosters isn’t binding.
“The FDA advisory committee’s decision is not binding, though the agency generally follows the advice of its advisory committees.”
That was an advisory panel. The FDA itself usually follows their recommendations.
I feel like this process is akin to peeling an onion…always more layers than first appears.
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a friend in Denver said that Colorado is rolling out boosters to those over 70 (or 65 she wasn’t sure) who are not immunocompromised (she’s not and no one asked). She’s 71, and went down to the local pharmacy which had a check in line where the gave everyone a slip for Pfizer or Moderna. Move to the next table. It was an assembly line process starting at 8:00 am.
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Yes, the FDA usually does follow the advisory panel’s recommendation… except when someone high up in the FDA clearly had something to gain, when despite the unanimous recommendations by the panel to NOT approve Biogen’s ineffective, dangerous alzheimer’s med, the FDA approved it. In my eyes, the FDA lost all credibility then. Now, with crystal clear data from Israel showing that the booster shots yielded a ten-fold decrease in infection rates and a twenty-fold decrease in serious illness, when compared to those who had had only the initial 2 dose series, their advisory panel’s recommendation to NOT approve boosters (except for the highly immunosuppresed , healthcare workers, and those over 65), only makes me find them even less credible, if that were at all possible. And I used to have faith in the FDA!
I think that a lot of those who already had the 2-dose series are taking matters into their own hands, and LYING in order to go get boosters. And I applaud them! Lying to save your own life, and that of those around you, is a virtue! Those clowns on the FDA panel couldn’t see what the data from a living lab study of 9.2 million people (Israel) showed? Israeli hospitals were overflowing with breakthrough cases - the booster doses stopped that. The alternative to no booster doses is higher risk of Covid infection! The likelihood of post-Covid lung and heart inflammation is far higher than the infinitesimally small risk of an inflammatory reaction to the vaccine.
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Well no, I don’t think people should take things into their own hands. I really hope people don’t start doing that and that those who are doing that, stop. You are advocating total chaos, with no real way to monitor results. And I don’t think lying is a good idea either.
There may be phases based on age, health and occupation. People need to be patient. Those over 65, with health conditions and certain occupations got the earliest vaccines and will get the earliest boosters.
To be fair, the FDA advisory committee is not the FDA per se / it is a panel of independent scientific advisers. The advisory committee did not recommend the Biogen’s AZ drug, but the FFA went against that grain. We don’t know if the FDA will follow the advice this time.
Supply is not the problem for most of Africa. Distribution is. 450k of the 168 million doses received so far were allowed to expire prior to distribution. Much of the remaining supply has not yet been used. Countries with competent infrastructure to deliver doses (Seychelles, Mauritius) have vax rates equal or better than the US. Larger and often poorer countries do not. The World Bank funded a new vax plant in South Africa expected to produce 400 million doses by year’s end which should help.
It is worth repeating that doses distributed to retail centers in the US will be discarded if not used by their expiration date.
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We will never be able to immunize enough people to stop the emergence of variants. Covid is not smallpox. It will be with us, in one shape or another, forever (thank you Wuhan Institute of Virology, and China’s authoritarian system which brutally suppressed any rapid response to the likely accidental leak of the virus). The best we can hope for is that the virus eventually devolves into a less virulent form that hence succeeds in circulating very widely, without killing its host, much as the other coronaviruses associated with the common cold have become.
The vaccine supply here is plentiful, and the US is also donating hundreds of millions of doses, repeatedly, to the 3rd world. Offering booster shots here will not change the overall trajectory of the pandemic, but it will help to avoid the collapse of our hospital system, speed the recovery of our economy, and inhibit the spread of the virus to those who cannot be vaccinated for legitimate medical reasons, on top of the selfish idiotic vaccine refusers. Of course, it also appears to decrease by tenfold an individual’s chance of infection, and by twenty-fold an individual’s chance of severe disease, requiring hospitalization. So if we assume that the US has 200 million people over the age of 12, and assume that all of them will eventually be exposed to the highly contagious delta variant, and assume that only 70% of them overall are fully immunized (140 million), booster shots for those 140 million people would prevent millions of infections, and likely hundreds of thousands of serious infections that would need hospitalization, and collapse our health system. This was exactly what was happening in Israel, and what has been averted by the 3rd dose. Israel has already administered some 3 million boosters and has reported that the side effects after the 3rd dose are minimal, similar to the side effects after the 2nd dose, and that serious side effects are extraordinarily rare, far rarer than the sequelae of Covid infection. More importantly, their hospital system hasn’t broken down under the burden of severe Covid cases, largely because of their rapid rollout of boosters for everyone.
Yes, in terms of public health, it would be better if everyone would get immunized, and if the FDA would speed the approval of a pediatric dose for younger children. But neither of those things is going to happen quickly. And of course, ethically, everyone in the world should have the same access to vaccines… and food, shelter, clean water, education, healthcare, justice, etc. But that’s not happening quickly, or at all, either. Should we forego repeat CABG surgeries, because there are places across the world where others cannot get even a first CABG done? My point is that the woes of the 3rd world are not a reason for the US to allow the collapse of our hospital system under the burden of severe breakthrough Covid infection, which is exactly what will happen if we foolishly ignore the data from Israel, as the FDA appears about to do.
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WHO is playing politics because that’s what they do. Why single out Africa as a breeding ground for variants, when it doesn’t matter where the cases are? All the de novo cases, as well as breakthrough cases, pose both an infection spread risk and a variant development risk.
Meanwhile, India has reneged on it promise to provide one billion vaccine doses to Covax https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/09/14/india-coronavirus-vaccine-export/, while the US has already sent 500M doses to Covax which haven’t all been distributed (some of those might have been the wasted ones).
Even in the face of that, recent news reports state that the US is negotiating with Pfizer to buy, then donate, another 500M to Covax (WHO’s covid vaccine distribution arm). https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/17/us/politics/biden-covid-summit.html
I agree with roycroftmom…all the US doses which are in the system are here to stay, so best we use them.
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Is there any concrete information out there for those of us in high risk professions (but do not meet the other criteria)? The info seems vague and spotty.
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High risk professions are not included as of now. Many have assessed their risk and have sought boosters on their own. You can also ask your physician to write the booster as an off-label prescription.
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At the FDA’s Vaccine and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee on Friday, the majority of the committee voted that more data is needed on the safety and efficacy of a booster before it can be fully approved. Then the committee unanimously approved expanding the emergency use authorization (EUA) of a third dose of the Pfizer vaccine for anyone 65 years of age or older as well as those who are at high risk for serious COVID-19, or at high risk of COVID-19 from occupational exposure, such as health care workers. As with the initial EUA approval of the Pfizer vaccine, the FDA committee wants to have enough data to be sure a third vaccine dose will benefit the broader American population. As the committee chair commented, “the beauty of an EUA is that it can be modified as more data comes in.”
The FDA staff will review the evidence and the advisory committee’s recommendation in deciding whether to fully approve the boosters, make no modifications to existing regulatory approval, or follow the committee’s advice and expand the EUA. Next, the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) must review and clarify the FDA’s findings before a final decision is made. These meetings will probably take place next week.
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I don’t think the FDA committee would have included anyone at high risk for occupational exposure if it hadn’t been for HCWs. But then there was mention of other occupational groups.
Once the FDA grants approval, I would just go ahead and get the Pfizer 3rd dose if I was 6 months or more post-2nd dose. I would have already done that if I were in a high risk occupation. It’s more tricky for Moderna, because the booster/3rd dose is supposedly going to be a half dosage. Also interesting is that the FDA’s advisory committee recommendation is for 6 months post-2nd dose and not 8 months as the WH admin had stated in their “boosters for all 8 months after 2nd dose” proclamation. I listened to Fauci carefully today on a Sunday news show, and his “a few more weeks” for Moderna to follow Pfizer in the process really means it could be into November (he said this today on a news show). And then J&J would be at least that far away, also.
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