Some health care providers in Maine began reaching out to vulnerable patients about possible COVID-19 booster shots in advance of their expected authorization by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, which came late Thursday night.
The FDA approval means that several million Americans who are especially vulnerable because of organ transplants, certain cancers or other disorders can get an extra dose of the Pfizer or Moderna COVID-19 vaccine to better protect them as the delta variant continues to surge.
In a letter to patients this week, Dr. Dan Loiselle, chief medical officer at Intermed, said the staff there has identified patients who would be eligible and they will be contacted to schedule appointments.
“The FDA and CDC continue to review vaccine data and will provide guidance if and when the general population should receive a booster,” he wrote. “We await that decision and will notify our patients as soon as we learn more.”
The recommendation will be to provide each of those people with a booster of whichever of the two vaccines they received initially. The FDA has not indicated if or when it might authorize boosters for those who received the one-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine, but the pharmaceutical company has said its version offers strong protection and recent studies have backed that up.
The Biden administration, meanwhile, has said that it plans to announce a vaccine booster strategy for all vaccinated Americans in September.
U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murphy said Wednesday in an interview with CNN that experts have been concerned about the risk for immunocompromised people with the spread of the delta variant. Those people might be more likely to develop serious symptoms if they were to contract COVID-19, which is still possible among vaccinated individuals.
“The FDA has been working hard to basically do the evaluation around safety and make sure that we have everything we need to make these additional doses available to people,” he said.
Maine CDC director Dr. Nirav Shah was asked about boosters during a press briefing on Thursday and said he wanted to wait and see who might be in the category before commenting further.
Shah said the good news is that studies have consistently shown all three authorized vaccines to be effective at both reducing the risk of infection and of serious illness if infected. Since vaccines have been authorized, the overwhelming majority of hospitalizations and deaths have been in unvaccinated individuals.
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