The FDA has not authorized a booster dose for the fall...

[Tiangou]

Was talking to my pharmacist. She said that if you've had two booster doses, there's no authorization for another.

Didn't make sense to me as it would seem that with waning resistance at the 4 month mark we'd be coming up on the right time for people to get some protection for the fall, and the CDC director was just talking about 3rd boosters.

But I was wrong:

https://www.fda.gov/emergency-preparedne...-which-one

No more boosters. Not even recommended for the immune-compromised.

(I assume that a doctor can prescribe it, but all of the doctors I've spoken to recently have told me that they're no longer receiving doses at their offices/hospitals.)

[pRICE cUBE]

Seems like the overall expectation is that everyone will eventually catch C19. Keep tests on hand and get acquainted with Paxlovid. People I know that have used Paxlovid say it worked very well for them.

[GGD]

Here's my understanding of the strategy. They're hoping for earlier availability of new formulation boosters that are effective against BA.4 and BA.5, and that's the booster they want everyone to get as soon as it's available. They'd rather have people wait for the new one rather than getting another dose of the one that's less effective that would also put those people on a delayed schedule (timing between doses) for getting the newer more effective one.

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shot...n-expected

But letting more people get boosted with the original vaccine now could interfere with plans to boost them with updated, hopefully more protective vaccines in the fall to blunt the toll of the winter surge.

That's why the administration is considering shifting the focus to the next generation of boosters. Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech were already scrambling to comply with the FDA's request to get new, hopefully more powerful "bivalent" boosters ready by October or November that target both the original strain of the virus and omicron subvariants BA.4 and BA.5.

The FDA is trying to get the companies to make those shots available even sooner — possibly as soon as September, according to a federal official familiar with the situation who is not authorized to talk about it publicly. The possible shift was first reported by The Washington Post.

If the bivalent boosters can be accelerated, the FDA would skip opening up fourth shots of the original vaccines this summer and just wait for the new double-barreled omicron vaccines in the fall.

[Tiangou]

GGD wrote:
Here's my understanding of the strategy. They're hoping for earlier availability of new formulation boosters that are effective against BA.4 and BA.5, and that's the booster they want everyone to get as soon as it's available. They'd rather have people wait for the new one die now than later.

FTFY.

[AllGold]

As if getting two boosters a couple months apart would kill you. :RollingEyesSmiley5:

[Speedy]

Whip out your extra CDC vaccination card.

[mattkime]

I think one of the primary arguments against continuing boosters past 4 is that there are diminishing returns. I'm happy to hear otherwise.

Anyway, did you find it difficult to become an immunologist, then a Ukraine expert, and then back to being an immunologist?

[Speedy]

They are afraid your immune system will try to attack any new infection with less effective B and T cell responses suited to the earlier strains rather than reacting to the newer strains - if you keep training your immune system with old vaccines.

[Ombligo]

So we are not supposed to drink bleach anymore?

[Mr645]

If boosters worked......