Due to the rampant surge of Omicron across the US, the FDA has taken measures to improve the vaccination rate. In this regard, the wait time to receive booster shots of the Moderna vaccine has been reduced to five months. Earlier, people had to wait for six months to receive the booster dose of the Covid vaccine.
Waiting Time For Moderna Booster Reduced To 5 Months By FDA
FDA decided on Friday, and it was also approved by the CDC considering the huge number of covid cases registered in the country. This means that people who have earlier received two doses of the Moderna vaccine will now be able to get the booster dose if the previous dose was more than five months old. People above the age of 18 are eligible to get the Moderna booster dose as per FDA.
It is interesting to note that even the Pfizer vaccine has a similar wait time with regard to the booster dose. The only difference is that Pfizer vaccines are available to people above the age of 5. However, when it comes to booster dose, only those above the age of 12 are eligible to get the third dose if there is a gap of at least five months between the second and booster dose.
Dr. Peter Marks, Vaccine Chief of FDA, said that taking vaccines is the best defense against Covid 19 in this situation. In this regard, reducing the wait time to get a booster dose will help millions of people to stay safe during this massive third wave. The Omicron variant is highly contagious compared to Delta, and there is an urgent need to ramp up vaccinations across the country.
There is good news for those who have taken the Johnson and Johnson vaccine. The wait time is reduced to only two months as the vaccine is a single dose vaccine, unlike others available in the market.
Recent studies done on booster doses have provided some interesting results. It was evident that taking the booster dose was an effective way to handle Omicron. The new variant is more transmissible than the previous one, and it has already infected millions of Americans within a short duration of time.
Even the monoclonal antibody treatments that effectively combat Delta are not working against Omicron, and the new variant has been successful in invading the response in this situation. However, those participants who had received booster doses within the last few weeks were able to combat Omicron.
This is positive news regarding the booster dose, and it should encourage one and all to go for the booster covid dose whenever they become eligible. There is a huge rush for vaccines, and test kits across the US as Omicron has affected millions of people in the last few weeks.
Many states struggle to get enough test kits, and people have to wait for long hours at the test facilities to get the covid test done. Even after getting the test done, they cannot get the results at the right time as the labs are overburdened with high volumes of patients coming for tests in the recent week.
Scientists are now working on finding the effectiveness of the booster dose in the long run. Even though the booster dose provides immediate protection against Omicron, it is important to know how long it lasts. No matter what, vaccines have proved effective in at least preventing serious symptoms in most cases.
As per recent data, those patients who needed ICU admissions were not vaccinated. On the other hand, those who had taken both doses only displayed mild symptoms, and they were able to recover within a few days.
