There’s been a flood of news about COVID-19 booster shots over the past week, with big decisions rolling in from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and their respective advisory committees. With all those different meetings and votes and decisions, you may be confused about who is actually supposed to get a booster and when.
Last night, CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky laid out the agency’s official recommendations for adults who got the Pfizer-BioNTech shot. (Decisions are still to come for people who got Moderna or Johnson & Johnson vaccines.) She said:
All long-term-care residents and people 65 or older should get a third dose starting at least six months after their second shot.
All people 50 or older with underlying medical conditions (like cancer, diabetes and chronic lung disease) should get a third dose starting at least six months after their second shot.
Younger adults who have underlying conditions may get a booster at least six months after initial vaccination, based on their individual risks and preferences.
Adults who work in settings where they’re likely to be exposed to the virus, like health care facilities or schools, may get a booster starting at the six-month mark, again depending on their individual risks and preferences.
Why “should” some groups get a booster, while others “may” get one? The agency is essentially saying that the data suggest that all elderly adults, long-term-care residents and older adults with medical conditions would benefit from a third dose, whereas the data are less robust, and therefore, the decision is more personal, for younger adults who may be at higher risk due to medical conditions or workplace exposure.
In a speech at the White House today, President Joe Biden urged the estimated 60 million Americans who fit into any of these four categories to get a booster, if they received the Pfizer-BioNTech shot. He stressed that boosters, like initial doses, will be free and offered at around 80,000 locations nationwide.
The Biden Administration has long been a vocal supporter of booster shots, originally saying in August that, beginning Sept. 20, such shots would be available to all adults eight months after their second doses. Earlier this week, the FDA stopped short of authorizing Pfizer boosters for all adults, but did authorize them for the elderly, people with underlying conditions and people who live or work in high-risk settings. The CDC’s advisory panel then voted against recommending boosters for people with high-risk jobs (like health-care, front-line and emergency workers and teachers), but Walensky decided to overrule that recommendation and give people with high-risk jobs the option of receiving a third dose. (Neither the CDC nor the FDA is bound to follow the advice of its advisory committee, though a deviation like Walensky’s is somewhat unusual.)
In a briefing today, Walensky said the decision was "about providing, rather than withholding, access," noting that the FDA's decision to recommend boosters for people in high-risk jobs was based on balancing the safety and effectiveness of the additional shot on an individual level with its potential to keep the virus from spreading through and impacting society at large.
There was spirited debate and high emotion during both the FDA and CDC’s expert panel meetings, illustrating the range of opinions on COVID-19 boosters. Similar discussions related to Moderna and Johnson & Johnson boosters are expected over the next few weeks, and we’ll be staying tuned to help break them down.
About 469.6 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine have been shipped to various U.S. states as of yesterday afternoon, of which over 387.8 million doses have been administered thus far, according to TIME's vaccine tracker. About 55% of Americans have been completely vaccinated.
More than 230.5 million people around the world had been diagnosed with COVID-19 as of 1 a.m. E.T. today, and more than 4.7 million people have died. On September 23, there were 479,302 new cases and 9,318 new deaths confirmed globally.
Here's how the world as a whole is currently trending:
Here's where daily cases have risen or fallen over the last 14 days, shown in confirmed cases per 100,000 residents:
And here's every country that has reported over 4.5 million cases:
The U.S. had recorded more than 42.6 million coronavirus cases as of 1 a.m. E.T. today. More than 684,000 people have died. On September 23, there were 125,604 new cases and 3,119 new deaths confirmed in the U.S.
Here's how the country as a whole is currently trending:
Here's where daily cases have risen or fallen over the last 14 days, shown in confirmed cases per 100,000 residents:
All numbers unless otherwise specified are from the Johns Hopkins University Center for Systems Science and Engineering, and are accurate as of Sept. 24, 9 a.m. E.T. To see larger, interactive versions of these maps and charts, click here.
WHAT ELSE YOU SHOULD KNOW
Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel predicted a global return to normal in a year; he foresees vaccine production ramping up enough to cover “everyone on this Earth” by mid-2022. His predictions, published yesterday by a Swiss newspaper, are ambitious given the slow rate of vaccination in many poorer countries; in many parts of the world, fewer than 20% of people have received even a first dose. That’s in part because vaccine makers like Moderna sent huge chunks of their initial supply directly to rich countries in the early months of rollout, forcing others to wait longer for shots.
Novavax has asked the World Health Organization to grant emergency-use authorization to its COVID-19 vaccine. The Maryland-based pharmaceutical company has not yet received authorization from U.S. or European regulators, but if the WHO provides its stamp of approval, Novavax’s vaccine could be provided to developing countries through the COVAX global vaccine-sharing plan.
The CDC today released a batch of studies on COVID-19 in schools. Among their findings: mask mandates were associated with a lower risk of an in-school COVID-19 outbreak and lower pediatric case rates in the surrounding community, supporting CDC recommendations that all students and staff, regardless of vaccination status, wear masks in K-12 schools. Failing to do so could lead to outbreaks and school closures, as 1,800 U.S. schools had already experienced by mid-September, according to the CDC.
Anyone who experiences COVID-19 symptoms should get tested, and those with serious symptoms should seek hospital care. However, some members of social media groups pushing COVID-19 misinformation are urging people not to go to the hospital if they or their loved ones catch the virus, NBC News reports. Instead, they recommend that people turn to drugs like ivermectin, which has not been proven to treat COVID-19 and can be dangerous when taken improperly. Notably, these groups are escalating their messaging even further by telling followers to pull loved ones with COVID-19 out of the ICU. For those sick enough to be admitted to the ICU, professional care in a hospital is critical to their survival.
At least three antiviral drugs that could offer an effective at-home treatment for COVID-19 are currently in clinical trials. The pills, which are meant to work similarly to the highly effective influenza treatment Tamiflu, would hopefully lessen the length and severity of a COVID-19 illness. It’s too soon to say if any or all of the drugs will prove effective, but clinical trial results are expected within the next few months.
Thanks for reading. We hope you find the Coronavirus Brief newsletter to be a helpful tool to navigate this very complex situation, and welcome feedback at coronavirus.brief@time.com. If you have specific questions you'd like us to answer, please send them to covidquestions@time.com.
If you were forwarded this and want to sign up to receive it daily, click here.
Today's newsletter was written by Jamie Ducharme and edited by Elijah Wolfson.
沒有留言:
張貼留言