Providers make plans to offer booster shots
Following CDC approval, first wave of dose eligibility could be next month
With federal officials recommending COVID19 booster shots for all Americans, Connecticut care providers say they are prepared to distribute hundreds of thousands of shots beginning as early as September.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Wednesday called for a third dose for anyone who received a Pfizer-biontech or Moderna vaccine, eight months after their second dose. The plan is awaiting approval from the Food and Drug Administration.
Dr. Jim Cardon, chief clinical officer at Hartford Healthcare, said Wednesday that the health system is still figuring out how best to distribute booster shots but that the process may look much different than it did earlier this year, when hundreds of residents lined up each day at mass vaccination sites.
The CDC said Wednesday its recommendation of COVID-19 booster shots came in response to evidence that the vaccines’ protection wanes over time, causing higher risk of breakthrough infection. The shots could begin the week of Sept. 20, the agency said.
During the initial vaccine rollout earlier this year, when vaccine demand was high and supply was low, providers set up the large sites capable of inoculating hundreds of people a day. Plenty of vaccine is now available, so Cardon said this time around much of the vaccine administration will likely happen in primary care offices.
“We’re in a much better place where if you have your clinician they should be able to vaccinate you in your office just like if you get a flu shot,” he said.
Still, Cardon said mass vaccination sites could reemerge as part of the booster-shot process.
“We are exploring whether we need some centralized locations to handle the volume that’s coming through,” he said. “I don’t think it will be anywhere near as big as [previously], but there may be some value in terms of vaccination to have some of the sites we’ve had in the past.”
Hospital officials say they don’t anticipate large backlogs for booster shots like last spring, when thousands of residents rushed to make appointments at once.
For one thing, they say, supply is more plentiful.
For another, people who have already been vaccinated might not feel the same rush to get a third shot.
“The immediacy and just the urgency may be a little different because in Connecticut we have a high rate of vaccination, so it’s not like people are totally unprotected, as was the case back in January and February,” said Dr. Ohm Deshpande, vice president of population health at Yale New Haven Health. “So while there are people who are going to be very enthusiastic and eager to get this booster, we’re not going to see those same huge rushes.”
Deshpande said the CDC’S announcement had come as a surprise and that officials were working through the optimal way to distribute booster shots.
“I don’t have a ton of detail, frankly, because we’re still actively developing it, but the short answer is that we will have capacity out there, and it probably will look a little different than it did the first time around,” he said.
Cardon said Hartford Healthcare plans to reach out to patients who were vaccinated earlier this year as they become eligible for third doses, in an attempt to “smooth” the distribution process.
In a statement Wednesday, Trinity Health of New England said it was “actively preparing the logistics necessary to appropriately administer these additional doses.”
While most Americans will have to wait for the fall at earliest to receive a third dose, immunocompromised residents who received the Pfizer-biontech or Moderna vaccines are already eligible, after clearance from the CDC and FDA last week.
Recipients of solid organ transplants and others who are significantly immunocompromised are encouraged to contact their doctors to arrange their shots.
Gov. Ned Lamont said Tuesday that Connecticut was “ready to go” as far as distributing third shots. In a statement Wednesday, the Connecticut Department of Public Health said it “will continue to work with our federal partners, vaccine providers, and other stakeholders to be sure we are ready to provide boosters when they are recommended.”
“Currently,” the statement said, “DPH is focusing on getting everyone their first doses and on the third doses for immunocompromised individuals.”