SALT LAKE CITY – According to Reuters, at least 1. 8 million people in the United States have already received the new COVID-19 vaccine.
Citing data collected through a North Carolina-based health care analytics firm, IQVIA Holdings, the news firm reported that the total for the week ending Sept. 22 would likely not include some shots administered at network vaccination centers and doctors’ offices.
“It sounds like a smart figure,” Michael Kleinrock, senior director of studies at IQVIA, told Reuters on Friday, noting that previously, the public fitness emergency and vaccination mandates had helped boost demand.
“The imperative to get vaccinated is much more of a component of the public debate,” Kleinrock said. The COVID-19 emergency ended in the United States last spring.
There hasn’t been any vaccine update since the fall of 2022, when a bivalent booster dose was released, targeting both the original strain of the virus and newer versions of the omicron variant that drove cases to record levels that year.
Reuters noted that about two weeks after the bivalent booster brought in last year, about 1. 5 million vaccines had been administered, suggesting there would likely be more interest in the new vaccine.
In the United States, more than 56 million people got the bivalent booster last spring, or 17% of the population, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In Utah, bivalent adoption is less than 16%.
The newer COVID-19 injections, which gained final federal approval on Sept. 12, are monovalent and address an earlier edition of the virus that, like variants circulating lately, is also linked to omicron.
People in Utah and the rest of the country have struggled to get the vaccine now being announced, and in some cases, insurers aren’t willing to cover prices if needed.
The updated shots, for any child 6 months and older, fit a national spike in COVID-19 symptoms that has led to what’s known as a “dramatic” increase in cases and hospitalizations.
Starting in July, weekly hospitalizations began to rise and as of early September had reached more than 20,000 for the first time since March. The CDC’s recent highs, for the week ending Sept. 23, put that figure at just over 19,000, down 3. 1 percent. % of last week.
In Utah, the average number of people hospitalized with COVID-19 for seven days rose more than 5% during the week ending Sept. 28, to just over 72, according to data from the Utah Department of Health and Human Services.