(CNN) – There is a new type of COVID-19 vaccine coming to a pharmacy or clinic near you.
The U. S. Food and Drug AdministrationThe U. S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the U. S. Centers for Disease Control and PreventionThe U. S. centers have approved updated boosters that target the original strain of the coronavirus, as well as the subvariants Omicron BA. 4 and BA. 5. The hope is that those injections will cover against the viruses circulating lately that cause Covid-19.
Here you will find everything you want to know about the new bivalent reinforcements and who can get them.
The new bivalent vaccines involve orders for our cells to protect against two strains of the virus that causes COVID-19. Vaccines direct cells to produce antibodies that bind to parts of the spike proteins of the original strain of the SARS-CoV-2 virus and the subvariants BA. 4 and BA. 5 Omicron, which represent the same tip.
BA. 4 and BA. 5 are the dominant variants in the United States, where there are an average of 91,000 new infections each day.
“These are vaccines that are manufactured, manufactured and delivered identically to the Covid mRNA vaccines that most of us have already received,” said Dr. Gregory Poland, who directs the vaccine organization at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. “In a sense, you just replaced the blueprints. “
However, having twice as many plans doesn’t mean you get twice the dose of active ingredients.
“The overall content of mRNA, the advertising component of the vaccine, that leads to the immune reaction is the same,” said Dr. William Gruber, Pfizer’s senior vice president of vaccines and progression, who is making one of the vaccine updates.
Pfizer’s recall is a 30-microgram dose containing 15 micrograms of mRNA versus the ancestral strain and 15 micrograms versus the BA. 4 and BA. 5 variants. It is allowed from the age of 12.
Moderna’s bivalent recall is a dose of 50 micrograms, with 25 micrograms of mRNA designed to combat the ancestral strain of the coronavirus and 25 micrograms of mRNA designed to combat the BA. 4 and BA. 5 variants. Other people 18 years of age and older are allowed.
The first injections of mRNA are still the first two injections a user will receive, but it is no longer allowed to be used as a booster in others over the age of 12.
Millions of vaccines are now being shipped to tens of thousands of sites across the country. These come with fitness centers, fitness centers, and network pharmacies.
CVS and Walgreens began providing the vaccines. Both networks are scheduling appointments online and say more spaces will be added as they get vaccine shipments.
Biden’s management expects appointment availability to pile up in the early days, with ample availability in a few weeks. People will look for places in Vaccines. gov.
“You’ll start to see some selling options over the weekend, but very little because of Labor Day weekend. And my wait ends next week, or indeed over the next 10 days, you will begin to see those bivalent vaccines widely available across the country,” Dr. Ashish Jha, who heads the White House Covid-19 reaction team, told CNN.
As with previous Covid-19 vaccines, those vaccines will be available free of charge. But they are possibly among the latest giveaways from the government against Covid-19, which has said it will start marketing remedies and vaccines this fall.
Americans over the age of 12 should get the new boosters as long as they have won their first round of vaccines.
Experts say everyone wants it, as coverage of vaccination and infection decreases especially over time and across all age groups.
“There will be benefits, necessarily for everyone, with obviously more benefits for older adults and those with underlying conditions,” Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said Friday on CNN.
Adults over the age of 18 can get vaccinated with Pfizer or Moderna. Teens over the age of 12 can receive an updated pfizer injection.
Wait two months after the last dose of the vaccine to receive an updated booster.
For those who have recently recovered from a COVID-19 infection, the CDC recommends waiting at least until the illness has passed and the user is no longer contagious. For more productive results, it would be more productive to maintain a booster for at least 3 months after symptoms begin. The infection itself has probably already acted as a reminder; Studies have shown that other people have a low risk of having health problems again for about 3 months after recovery.
You may not have to wait up to 3 months if Covid-19 levels are already high in your network or if your immune system is reduced.
“I, for example, have been vaccinated, double-booster, and infected, and will get the bivalent BA. 4/5 vaccine updated within 3 months of my infection, exactly as authorized by the FDA and CDC,” Fauci said. .
The government is also preparing to launch a crusade that will inspire Americans to receive an annual flu shot with an updated Covid-19 booster.
Children older than five to 11 years can still be vaccinated with older single-strain vaccines.
Vaccine brands are updating boosters for young children lately. Pfizer said it is renewing its vaccines for children ages five to 11 and will apply to the FDA for approval of the updated boosters in early October. It works with the FDA to update vaccines for young people older than 6 months to four years.
Until they’re ready, the best way to protect infants, toddlers, and elementary school students is to offer eligible family and friends an up-to-date vaccine.
Yes, but that’s not all. If a fitness challenge or medication has decreased your immune function, the CDC recommends a dual technique to strengthen your COVID-19 coverage: vaccination and preventive treatment with a type of passive immunity called Evusheld. Passive immunity occurs when antibodies are produced in the laboratory and then administered through injection or infusion to help other people who cannot make enough of this coverage on their own.
Evusheld can be taken every six months and is available to other immunocompromised people over the age of 12. It requires a prescription, but the treatment itself is free. The CDC estimates that another 7 million people might be eligible to take Evusheld, however, Maximum didn’t get it because they don’t know it.
If you want Evusheld, you must wait at least two weeks after receiving a Covid-19 vaccine to take it. But after a user takes Evusheld, there is no waiting period to receive an updated reminder.
A recent review of adverse events after mRNA booster shots in adults in the United States found that side effects were less common after booster doses than after momentary doses of the vaccine, and most were mild. About 1 in 8 adults reported headache, fever, or pain after a recall. In children and adolescents, the side effects reported after the recall were injection site pain, fatigue, headache, and muscle pain.
Very rarely, mRNA vaccines can cause myocarditis or inflammation in or around the heart. After more than 80 million booster doses administered in the United States, protective tracking systems obtained 37 verifiable reports of myocarditis. Most of them were men.
The highest rates of myocarditis in adults occurred in younger men, aged 18 to 24 years. For every million booster doses given to men this age, the CDC expects them to have myocarditis. For teens, the rate is consistent with but still incredibly low: about 11 cases of myocarditis consistent with millions of doses.
Dr. Peter Marks, who directs the FDA’s Center for Biological Research and Evaluation, said that to minimize that risk, order vaccines to be given at least two months after a previous dose.
“It turns out to be related when they’re around others,” he said.
The evidence from those updated vaccines is a little different from what’s behind previous versions. These are the first Covid-19 vaccines allowed for use in humans after being tested only on mice, following virtually the same procedure that is used every year. flu vaccine update.
The FDA has legal bodies to send animal information to speed up those public shootings. Human studies are ongoing. Marks of the FDA said he expects it to be a month or two before human knowledge becomes available.
Officials say the urgency with those withdrawals is warranted in the fall, when covid-19 is still circulating at the highest levels and the flu is expected to return. But some vaccine experts say animal studies don’t provide enough evidence for those vaccines at this time of the pandemic.
“You’re asking other people to get a new product for which there’s no data,” Dr. Paul Offit, who runs the vaccine teaching center at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, told CNN. “The data in mice are not enough to launch an effort of more than a hundred billion doses. “
Offit says it makes sense to use knowledge from animal studies for annual flu vaccine updates because we’ve been those vaccines for decades and we perceive what biomarkers to look for to assess whether they work. These so-called coverage correlates are not as well understood for Covid-19 vaccines.
It’s not just the injections that are different, Poland said. At this level of the pandemic, so is our immune system. Nearly every American has been infected with the coronavirus, vaccinated, or both. Some other people have gained 4 or five doses of vaccine.
“So if you say, ‘Can you guarantee me that getting dose five or sixth of this new vaccine in the background after receiving those previous doses is surely safe?’ I would say ‘no, I can’t. ‘We extrapolate and I think we want to be transparent about it,” Poland said.
FDA officials say animal studies weren’t the only knowledge they analyzed to make their decision. They looked at two other lines of evidence.
The first is about the history of vaccines. The same fundamental vaccines have now been given to billions of people around the world. They have proven to be incredibly effective in preventing serious illness and death due to Covid-19. The risks associated with mRNA vaccination are very, very low.
The current source of knowledge comes from bivalent vaccines that will soon be used in Europe and Canada.
Earlier this year, Pfizer and Moderna presented a panel of independent experts who advised the FDA on knowledge on a bivalent vaccine designed to target the original strain of Omicron, BA. 1. This knowledge showed that vaccines stimulated antibody responses and were well tolerated. Other countries have legalized those vaccines, however, they will not be available in the United States.
The BA. 1 strain is no longer circulating and the FDA has asked brands to update their vaccines in the U. S. The U. S. department of homeland security to include BA. 4 and BA. 5 instead. Some evidence suggests that the BA. 4 and BA. 5 strains generate a more potent immune reaction than BA. 1, which is another explanation for why officials wanted to accompany them in the updated plans.
FDA Commissioner Dr. Robert Califf said he understands that other people need to know more, but he’s convinced those vaccines are effective.
“It’s okay for other people to ask questions. But this is actually the most productive consensus we have among experts that this is the most productive way forward. . . It is painful to see other people die needlessly when there is a loose remedy to save you from their death,” he said.
“I’ll be on the front line at the pharmacy to get vaccinated,” said Califf, who turns 71 next month. “I’m very interested in that. “
In the past, testing of variant-specific vaccines has performed poorly. It’s unclear how effective those bivalent vaccines can be.
In a recent pre-printed matrix published before the peer review, the scientists tried to estimate this with a meta-analysis or studies. The estimates collected antibody levels after booster doses against ancestral strains as well as against express variants, and tried to use those grades to be waiting for the efficacy of injections.
They found that other people got the most benefits from being stimulated, period. An opposite market recall to the ancestral strain that increased neutralizing antibodies up to 11. The scientists estimated that this would increase a person’s protection against symptomatic infection over the next six months up to 50% to 86. 5%.
The variant-specific reinforcements worked a little better, but the difference wasn’t dramatic. After those injections, coverage against symptomatic infections over the next six months increased to 90. 2%, an increase of 4. 6%.
Covid-19 vaccines to be updated.
As the coronavirus circulated, it replaced a lot. These adjustments helped it outperform the antibodies we made compared to previous versions of the virus and previous versions of the vaccine. As a result, it is more effective in causing reinfections and advanced infections.
The hope is that giving others up-to-date vaccines will improve their ability to fight infections and coverage against serious illnesses that lead to hospitalization or death.
There is also some hope that the updated boosters will possibly delay the spread of the virus and therefore the speed at which anti-vaccine variants are emerging.
The coronavirus is evolving at lightning speed. At an assembly with FDA vaccine advisors last June, Trevor Bedford, a professor of epidemiology and biostatistics at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Reserach Center in Seattle, the speed of evolution of the viruses that cause COVID-19 to that of the viruses that cause the flu.
Among the fastest flu viruses, he said, it takes about three years for a new strain to emerge and begin showing up in tests in significant amounts. Among the variants of the virus that causes covid-19, the Delta variant achieved this feat in one year. Omicron did it in 3 to 4 months.
Therefore, there is a genuine fear that, with nothing to stop the transmission of the infection, we will get stuck in recovery mode, waiting for faster and potentially more harmful variants to emerge.
El-CNN-Wire™
By Brenda Goodman, CNN