Echoing the statement of the CDC and the FDA, US chief medical advisor to President Joe Biden, Anthony Fauci said that the Americans don’t need a third booster shot of COVID vaccine yet.
Drugmaker Pfizer on Thursday said that it is picking up its efforts to develop a booster dose, which will protect people from COVID variants. However, the US two top federal agencies, CDC and FDA said that people don’t need a third booster vaccine yet and it is not up to companies to decide alone when they might be needed.
Talking to CNN, Anthony Fauci said that theoretically (3rd booster vaccine shot) could help vulnerable (people) but.. right now given the data … they don’t feel that we need to tell people right now, ‘You need to be boosted’.”
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“The CDC and the FDA were saying is that right now given the date and the information, we do not need to give people (a) third shot, a boost superimposed upon the two doses you get with the mRNA and the one dose you get with J&J (Johnson & Johnson),” Anthony Fauci told CNN.
However, he added that the medical experts are looking at the feasibility of a third vaccine shot and when it should be given to people as a booster.
The FDA and CDC hours after Pfizer’s statement on Thursday said in a joint statement, “Americans who have been fully vaccinated do not need a booster shot at this time.”
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“We don’t know whether booster vaccines will be needed to maintain protection against COVID-19 until additional data is collected,” the World Health Organization told CNN and added, “limited data available on how long the protection from current doses lasts and whether an additional booster dose would be beneficial and for whom.”
Amid concerns over the spread of the Delta COVID variant, the US government has said that fully vaccinated people are at low risk of infection from the variants of concern or the variants that are more transmissible.
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More than 158 million US residents have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19, out of which, over half the people have taken Pfizer.