Expect an Omicron Booster This Fall
COVID vaccines haven’t transitioned to annual shots like the flu vaccine, but regular boosters will likely continue.
It’s official: We’re going to get COVID-19 vaccines formulated against Omicron and its subvariants, which have continued to wreak havoc this summer. The FDA’s independent advisory committee met Tuesday to discuss a single question: whether to recommend that vaccine manufacturers produce a COVID booster that includes a component against Omicron. By the end of the meeting, the Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee (VRBPAC) voted 17-to-2 to recommend boosters that specifically target Omicron.
Even better is that both Pfizer and Moderna have already been testing Omicron boosters and presented data on them at the meeting. (Disclosure: I’ve received one since I’m enrolled in the Omicron booster shot trial for Moderna.) With trial data already available and the FDA’s blessing, there’s a good chance the Omicron-plus boosters should become available in October, according to remarks at the meeting by Peter Marks, MD, PhD, who directs the FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research.
When I spoke with William Schaffner, MD, a professor of infectious disease at Vanderbilt University and medical director of the National…
