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Coronavirus vaccine demand grows in U.S. amid omicron variant concerns

AnnAbelle TimsiT The WAshingTon PosT

Demand for coronavirus vaccines has spiked in the United states in recent weeks, as more Americans are eligible for booster shots and concerns grow over the omicron variant. health-care providers administered 2.18 million doses of coronavirus vaccines on Thursday, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention - the “highest single-day total since May,” the White house said. According to the latest CDC report, over the week ending on Thursday, the average number of daily administered vaccine doses reported to the agency was 22 percent higher than the previous week. since omicron was first confirmed in southern Africa on nov. 25, and soon after listed as a “variant of concern” by the World health organization, the Biden administration has been urging as many Americans as possible to get booster shots as the best means to protect themselves against it. All U.s. adults became eligible for boosters on november 19.

For most of october, fewer than or slightly over 1 million doses of coronavirus vaccines were reported to the CDC as being administered every day in the United states. By mid-november, those numbers hovered around 1.5 million on average. in the past three reporting days, they neared or exceeded 2 million.

Much is still unknown about omicron, against which some scientists and vaccine makers predict existing vaccines may not be as effective, but the new variant and “the idea that we have a virus that may evade two shots but that three shots are likely to be pretty protective, i think, has also gotten a lot of people much more focused on getting a booster,” says Ashish K. Jha, dean of the Brown University school of Public health.

The increased demand for coronavirus vaccines is largely driven by demand for booster doses, CDC data shows. White house covid-19 data director Cyrus shahpar, calling out the booster numbers, cited the spread of omicron in a tweet, saying the country needs “to keep this up.”

The timeline for increased vaccine uptake precedes omicron and the adult booster expansion: Millions of children between the ages of 5 and 11 became eligible for a pediatric dose of the Pfizer-BionTech vaccine on nov. 2.

But omicron “may be the ‘boost’ to help the unvaccinated and the newly eligible to get motivated and vaccinated quickly,” said scott Ratzan, a health communication expert at CUnY school of Public health, in an email to The Washington Post. increased interest in vaccines can be attributed in part to clearer, concerted messaging around boosters coming from public health agencies, Jha said. There now exists “a broad consensus” among experts, he added, that boosters are needed, and “that’s helping a lot.”

While the uptake in booster doses is encouraging, “i am not seeing a ton of progress among (unvaccinated) adults who have been eligible for a long time,” Jha said. “A lot of people in America are relying on infectioninduced immunity to get them through the rest of this pandemic, and i think omicron is going to test that in a way that nothing else has. i’m worried we’re going to see a lot of those people who’ve previously been infected and recovered get reinfected and potentially very sick.”

The first U.s. case of omicron was identified in California on Dec. 1, and cases have since been reported in at least 15 U.s. states, CDC Director Rochelle Walensky told ABC news sunday. The delta variant, not omicron, accounts for the large majority of U.s. coronavirus cases at this stage, she said.

The CDC notes that its reported numbers are estimates that are subject to change and may contain duplicates, “over-estimates of first doses and under-estimates of subsequent doses.”

The White house has also urged Americans to get vaccinated ahead of the holiday season, when families usually gather indoors.

After the omicron variant was first identified in the United states, the CDC said its emergence highlighted the importance of vaccination and other public health measures. “everyone 5 and older should get vaccinated and boosters are recommended for everyone 18 years and older,” the agency said in a statement.

Members of the White house coronavirus response team expressed confidence at a news briefing Friday that existing coronavirus vaccines would confer a measure of protection against the newly identified variant.

“Although we haven’t proven it yet, there’s every reason to believe that if you get vaccinated and boosted that you would have at least some degree of cross-protection, very likely against severe disease, even against the omicron variant,” national institute of Allergy and infectious Diseases Director Anthony Fauci said.

According to the CDC, more than 70 percent of the U.s. population has received at least one dose of a coronavirus vaccine, with near-universal coverage among those ages 65 and older. nearly 60 percent of the population is fully vaccinated. still, on Thursday, President Joe Biden said more than 100 million Americans who are eligible for booster doses haven’t gotten theirs yet. some pharmacies – which the White house said are distributing roughly two-thirds of coronavirus vaccines in the United states – have reported that they are struggling to meet the increased demand amid staff shortages in the health-care sector.

Breakthrough Covid cases have become more common, underscoring need for boosters, study finds

Tribune ConTenT AgenCy

hARTFoRD, Conn. — Covid-19 cases in vaccinated people have become increasingly common in recent months amid the spread of the delta variant and the waning of immunity from vaccination, according to new Yale research conducted in Connecticut.

Yale researchers found that from August to mid-october 2021, about 22% of patients at Yale new haven hospital with Covid-19 were fully vaccinated and experiencing severe symptoms – an increase from 1.4% in the same health system from March to July. hyung Chun, associate professor of medicine at Yale and the new study’s senior author, said these findings could owe in part to the spread of the delta variant during the second half of the year, but that the most likely explanation was the decline of vaccine immunity over time. in that way, Chun said, the new research underscores the importance of booster shots for vaccinated people.

“The emerging data is pretty clear that the efficacy of the first vaccines are waning but that the boosters remain to be the best treatment available to prevent one from catching Covid-19 or becoming sick with Covid19,” Chun said.

Chun noted that the Yale study was conducted before the recent emergence of the omicron variant but said the new strain doesn’t change the need for residents to get vaccinated and to seek booster shots.

As of mid-november, all American adults are eligible for booster shots six months after their second dose of the PfizerBionTech or Moderna vaccine and two months after their dose of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 27.2% of Connecticut’s fully vaccinated adults had received boosters, as of Friday.

The new Yale study, which was published Friday in The Lancet Microbe, is consistent with other research suggesting the immunity from Covid-19 vaccines wanes over time, leaving people increasingly vulnerable as they get further and further out from their shots.

Despite finding an increase in breakthrough cases over the second half of the year, Chun emphasized that vaccination remains highly important in slowing Covid-19. According to the Yale study, vaccinated Covid-19 patients tended to be older than unvaccinated patients and to have more serious underlying conditions but still typically had shorter hospital stays and lower mortality rates.