An outdoor vaccine advisory panel from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention voted unanimously Tuesday to propose the use of Novavax’s COVID-19 vaccine. Now, the CDC says it has officially approved the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices vote, officially opening up a fourth option for unvaccinated adults.
“Today, we expanded the features available to adults in the United States by recommending some other effective COVID-19 vaccine. If I was expecting a COVID-19 vaccine based on a different generation than the past, now is the time to sign up for the millions of Americans who have been vaccinated,” said CDC Director Dr. Susan S. Brown. Rochelle Walensky, in a statement.
The advice comes a week after the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) legalized the Novavax vaccine for emergency use as a new option for unvaccinated adults. 19 vaccine.
Some of those Americans may be persuaded to get vaccinated with Novavax vaccines, the company’s chief medical officer, Dr. Filip Dubovsky, told CDC advisers on Tuesday.
“Our vaccine is based on a platform that is well understood. Recombinant protein vaccines have been used around the world for decades and this may be important, especially for those who are reluctant to get vaccinated,” Dubovsky told the panel.
CDC survey data presented to counselors found that 16% of unvaccinated respondents would “probably” or “definitely” get a protein-based vaccine like Novavax. 52% said they would “probably” or “definitely” get the vaccine.
“Today is another step forward in our country’s fight against the virus,” President Biden said Tuesday. “Following an independent clinical review through the Food and Drug Administration last week and today through the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Novavax’s approved the protein-based COVID-19 vaccine for adults. We now have 4 safe and effective COVID-19 vaccines to protect Americans from serious illness, hospitalization and death. “
As a general rule, vaccines can begin once Walensky has officially approved the committee’s recommendations. Biden’s management announced last week that it would deliver 3. 2 million doses to states.
However, it is unclear when the 3. 2 million doses will be distributed and how the first materials will be distributed. Novavax said Tuesday that the first batch of its vaccine passed quality testing and will be shipped for distribution to the U. S. government. UU. ” in the coming days. ” The CDC said in one that the vaccine “will be available in the coming weeks. “
A spokesman for the Department of Health and Human Services responded to a request for comment.
During the deployments of other brands, suppliers had already begun receiving shipments after the FDA granted their approval, vaccinators had to wait for the green light from the CDC to begin injections.
Novavax’s vaccine works by giving the immune formula a part of the virus grown in insect cells and combined with an element, called an adjuvant, derived from the bark of trees that aims to increase its effectiveness in the body.
mRNA vaccines are now available to offer cells with a model for creating state-of-the-art proteins to cause an immune response from the body. Novavax, on the other hand, includes protein in its vaccine.
Novavax’s technique is one of the reasons the company believes its vaccine also appears to cause fewer side effects in the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna injections. For example, Lisa Dunkle of Novavax told the panel that “it’s incredibly rare, unlike other vaccines” to see fever in their tests.
However, like mRNA injections, the Novavax vaccine will bring a warning about the risk of rare effects of central inflammation called myocarditis and pericarditis.
The CDC told the panel it will publish recommendations that allow Americans receiving Novavax injections to place their first two injections up to 8 weeks, such as its recommendation for mRNA vaccines, which can threaten myocarditis and increase vaccine effectiveness.
The company will also propose that Americans wait to avoid getting vaccinated within 4 weeks of vaccination against orthopoxvirus, which also carries a possible risk of myocarditis. However, the CDC said the delay would not apply to other people who were introduced to the Jynneos or ACAM2000 vaccines to combat the developing monkeypox outbreak.
“That’s because the advantages of administering an orthopoxvirus vaccine as soon as possible, when indicated for prophylaxis, outweigh the imaginable threat of myocarditis if given too close,” Elisha Hall of the CDC told the panel.
In clinical trials conducted prior to the Omicron variant, Novavax has been shown to be 90. 4% effective in preventing any symptomatic COVID-19 infection and up to one hundred percent effective compared to moderate to severe illnesses.
Novavax is also reading possible versions of its vaccine that could function as boosters adapted to the Omicron variant. Like the mRNA injections, Novavax said the data suggests antibodies to its vaccine declined after six months.
However, the company informed CDC advisors that it said it warned that its existing vaccine formulas could also be very effective, after a booster dose, in protecting against Omicron’s BA. 5 subprogeny, which now accounts for more than 3 of 4 new ones. infections in the nationwide wave.
“As we immunize with more doses of our recombinant spike protein vaccine, we minimize the antigenic distance and begin to see a more universal reaction opposite to the variants,” Dubovsky said.