Many who received J&J shot are rushing to get boosters

Jennifer Lopez, 58, had jumped at the chance to get the Johnson & Johnson vaccine last March, but she soon began feeling regret when data showed it might be less effective than other coronavirus vaccines.

So when the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention signed off on booster shots Thursday night for all Johnson & Johnson recipients who had gone two months since their shot, Lopez wasted no time seeking one out.

“I’m actually on my way today to go get it,” the Paso Robles, Calif., woman said Friday.

Lopez was part of a throng of booster seekers, many of them recipients of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, who rushed to get additional shots Friday, just hours after federal officials cleared the Johnson & Johnson and Moderna boosters.

An estimated 70 million people who received vaccines in the U.S. are eligible for all of the three authorized boosters, officials said. That includes most of the 15 million recipients of the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine.

Many consumers were buoyed by the news that they could pick a booster different than their original brand, with some Johnson & Johnson recipients saying they coveted the added security of the Moderna or Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines, based on studies showing they offered greater protection. The Pfizer-BioNTech booster already had been authorized.

Others were confused by the socalled mix-and-match policy. Lopez, at heightened risk for severe infection because of her weight, among other issues, said she expected to get a second Johnson & Johnson shot. When a reporter told her she could choose any of the three boosters, she was surprised and relieved, saying she would prefer to get a different shot that offered more protection.

“I had a lot of regret about choosing J & J,” she said.

Erin Dwyer, 40, shared those sentiments, and began refreshing the CVS Pharmacy website to make an appointment to get a Pfizer BioNTech booster Thursday night.

At first, she saw an error message that said she wasn’t eligible to get the messenger RNA vaccine seven months after her Johnson & Johnson shot. She said she tried again in the early morning, but the website crashed. She refreshed the page again and again, and eventually, snagged an appointment for Friday morning.

“Even the pharmacist was impressed,” said Dwyer, an associate professor of history at Oakland University near Detroit. “I was the first booster of the day.”

Bruce Nilles, 58, of Oakland, Calif., also scored an early shot. He made an appointment online at 6 a.m. and was in line for a Pfizer-BioNTech booster at his local Walgreens by 9:15 a.m. The pharmacist was still reading the CDC’s new guidance when Nilles walked up to the counter for his booster.

“He says, ‘I just printed off the memo, let me finish reading it,’ ” he said. Nilles got his booster a few minutes later.

Not everyone was successful amid foul-ups on the first day of the expanded rollout. Some providers hadn’t been notified in the early morning that the Moderna and Johnson

& Johnson boosters were cleared for use. And some large pharmacies were still updating their online appointment-making systems to accommodate the new policies.

When Bethesda, Md., attorney Brad Shear, 48, heard he was eligible for one of the mRNA boosters, he was eager to get another shot. Shear had received the Johnson & Johnson vaccine in the spring when the public health message was to “get whatever you can get,” he said Friday. But he grew increasingly nervous about the level of his protection as the months passed.

Shear scheduled an appointment for 11:20 a.m. Friday at a pop-up clinic in a Maryland suburb jointly run by the community and Giant Pharmacy. The clinic’s flier advertised several vaccines, including PfizerBioNTech boosters for those eligible. But pharmacy personnel took one look at his vaccination card and told Shear the state hadn’t been authorized to give mix-and-match boosters.

“They turned me down!” Shear said. “This is insane.”

Around 10 a.m., Maryland officials emailed vaccine providers that they should make Moderna and Johnson & Johnson boosters available to eligible Marylanders, effective at 11 a.m., according to Maryland health department spokesman Andy Owen.

Giant Food spokeswoman Felis Andrade said when the retailer booked the clinic with the community weeks earlier, only the PfizerBioNTech booster was approved, which the pharmacy agreed to provide.

Shear, meanwhile, was able to schedule an appointment for Monday night with CVS.