US CDC endorses booster shots for millions

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention yesterday endorsed booster shots for millions of older or otherwise vulnerable Americans, opening a new phase in the US vaccination drive against Covid-19.

CDC Director Dr Rochelle Walensky signed off on a series of recommendations from a panel of advisers yesterday.

The advisers said boosters should be offered to people 65 and older, nursing home residents and those ages 50 to 64 who have risky underlying health problems. The extra dose would be given once they are at least six months past their last Pfizer shot.

However, Walensky decided to make one recommendation that the panel had rejected.

The panel yesterday voted against saying that people can get a booster if they are ages 18 to 64 years and are health-care workers or have another job that puts them at increased risk of being exposed to the virus. But Walensky disagreed and put that recommendation back in, noting that such a move aligns with a FDA booster authorisation decision earlier this week.

Yesterday’s decision represented a dramatic scaling back of the Biden administration plan announced last month to dispense boosters to nearly everyone to shore up their protection. On Thursday, the Food and Drug Administration signed off on Pfizer boosters for a much narrower slice of the population than the White House envisioned.

The booster plan marks an important shift in the nation’s vaccination drive. Britain and Israel are already giving a third round of shots over strong objections from the World Health Organisation that poor countries don’t have enough for their initial doses.