Boosters: Let's Hope for a Smoother Rollout This Time

UCLA Health sent out an email this morning concerning what appears to be an imminent approval for booster shots and (somewhat less imminent) shots for kids under 12: 

FDA may weigh in on COVID-19 vaccine booster doses this week

Last week, a scientific advisory committee to the FDA recommended against approving a Pfizer-BioNTech booster for the general public. However, they unanimously voted to approve a third (booster) dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for:

-Anyone 65 and older

-People 16 and older who are at high risk of serious illness from COVID-19

A CDC advisory committee is scheduled to review the recommendation later this week and provide more detailed guidance, specifically defining who is at high risk of serious illness from COVID-19 or at high occupational risk of exposure.

Additional meetings are expected so that the FDA and CDC can weigh in on whether people who received the two-dose Moderna vaccine or the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine also need a booster. UCLA Health is preparing for booster dose administration now. We’ll share more information when it’s available.

What about the COVID-19 vaccine for kids?

On Monday, Pfizer announced that a clinical trial demonstrated its COVID-19 vaccine is safe, well tolerated and showed robust neutralizing antibody responses in children ages 5 to 11. The two doses for this younger demographic, delivered 21 days apart, is one-third the amount of the current doses for adolescents and adults. Pfizer noted it will apply for emergency use authorization from the FDA by the end of the month. If everything goes smoothly, 5- to 11-year-olds might become eligible to receive their COVID-19 vaccine by Halloween. Clinical trial results for children under 5 are not yet available.

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Let's hope for a smooth rollout of the boosters by UCLA Health. As faithful blog readers will recall, the rollout last winter for vaccinations was not so smooth:

https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2021/02/ucla-needs-new-vaccine-rollout-for_10.html; https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2021/02/ucla-needs-new-vaccine-rollout-for.html; https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2021/01/ucla-needs-new-vaccine-rollout-for_26.html; https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2021/01/ucla-needs-new-vaccine-rollout-for_25.html; https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2021/01/ucla-needs-new-vaccine-rollout-for.html.