Federal health officials have shortened the recommended interval between receipt of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine series and a booster shot to five months from six months, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced Tuesday, Jan. 4.
The interval for Moderna’s booster (six months) and Johnson & Johnson’s (two months) remains the same.
The decision is part of a strategy by the Food and Drug Administration and CDC to increase the number of booster shot recipients and build up Americans’ immunity in response to surging cases driven by the omicron variant, officials said. Officials also expanded the range of people eligible for receiving a COVID-19 booster doses to younger and immunocompromised children.
Omicron is now estimated to account for 95% of COVID-19 cases in the United States.
“We will continue to update our recommendations to ensure the best possible protection for the American people,” CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky, M.D., said in a statement. “[T]oday’s recommendations ensure people are able to get a boost of protection in the face of omicron and increasing cases across the country.”
“A booster dose of the currently authorized vaccines may help provide better protection against both the delta and omicron variants,” said Peter Marks, M.D., Ph.D., director of the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research at the Food and Drug Administration.
“In particular, the omicron variant appears to be more resistant to the antibody levels produced in response to the primary series doses from the current vaccines,” he added in a statement, also released Tuesday.
