CDC recommends Pfizer recipients get booster after 5 months
FILE – A staff member from the National Health Organisation (EODY) prepares a booster Johnson and Johnson vaccine against COVID-19 at Karatepe refugee camp, on the northeastern Aegean island of Lesbos, Greece, Wednesday, Dec. 15, 2021. The fast-moving omicron variant is complicating a key question: How does the COVID-19 pandemic end and the world co-exist with this virus? Experts agree that the coronavirus is here to stay. Ending the pandemic won’t be like flipping a light switch. (AP Photo/Panagiotis Balaskas, File)
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(The Hill) — The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommended on Tuesday that Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine recipients get a booster dose five months after their second shot instead of the previously approved six months.
The agency endorsed the shorter period after the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) authorized the reduced timeline on Monday for those who received the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. The CDC still suggests that Johnson & Johnson and Moderna recipients receive their boosters two months and six months, respectively, after the primary series.
The CDC also suggested moderately and severely immunocompromised 5- to 11-year-olds would be eligible for an additional dose about a month after their second shot, aligning their recommendations for the age group with immunocompromised adults.
“Following the FDA’s authorizations, today’s recommendations ensure people are able to get a boost of protection in the face of omicron and increasing cases across the country, and ensure that the most vulnerable children can get an additional dose to optimize protection against COVID-19,” CDC Director Rochelle Walensky said in a statement.
The CDC’s advisory panel is slated to meet Wednesday to discuss whether to recommend boosters for 12- to 15-year-olds after the FDA expanded access to the extra doses among young teens.
