Re: New SARS type virus spreading in China

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Hope you all get better soon, INVICTVS138.
This virus reminds me of the old Alistair MacLean novel "The Satan Bug" which he originally wrote under the pen name "Ian Stuart" in 1962--60 years ago, back when bio and chemical weapons were still being developed and deployed by the US government. (It was made into a pretty terrible movie).

MacLean's most famous novels were "The Guns of Navarone" and "Where Eagles Dare"
"Even if the bee could explain to the fly why pollen is better than shit, the fly could never understand."

Re: New SARS type virus spreading in China

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Wino wrote: Tue Feb 22, 2022 10:34 am Bless their little minds - no horse sense at all. LOL

https://arstechnica.com/science/2022/02 ... -politics/

https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/medica ... ar-AAU7eps

If the unvaccinated think their freedom to refuse vaccination is more important than their lives, they are free to commit suicide. I do object to their clogging up our health care system.
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." - Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Re: New SARS type virus spreading in China

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As coronavirus case counts continue to plummet across the United States, people’s immunity may be declining, too. Several studies have found that while mRNA booster shots have been successful at preventing hospitalization and death, their effectiveness against infections is waning.

It’s no wonder, then, that late Thursday, Moderna sought emergency use authorization from the Food and Drug Administration for a second booster shot for all adults. The company’s request came just days after Pfizer and BioNTech filed for emergency authorization for a second booster of its coronavirus vaccine for people 65 and older.


Moderna said that its much broader request would give the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, as well as health care providers, more flexibility in determining who would benefit most from getting an additional booster shot and when.

Scientists and physicians are sharply divided over this. “I don’t think everybody should get another booster right now,” said Dr. Yvonne Maldonado, a pediatric infectious diseases physician at Stanford University. “But I don’t see any reason why we shouldn’t start to review the data that is available.”

Who is currently eligible for a fourth vaccine dose?

As of now, the only people authorized for a fourth dose are those with weakened immune systems. This includes teenagers and adults who have had organ or stem cell transplants, are undergoing chemotherapy for cancer, have advanced or untreated H.I.V. or are on immune-suppressing drugs.

It’s hard to predict how soon — or if — the F.D.A. might authorize a second booster (or fourth dose) for all adults. The agency is expected to convene an advisory committee next month to discuss the issue. And while experts say it’s reasonable that the committee might move swiftly on Pfizer’s application for older adults, it is unclear if Moderna’s more sweeping request will get the green light.

“We know that people over the age of 65, even when vaccinated, have a higher risk of dying than people under the age of 65,” said Dr. Carlos del Rio, an infectious disease specialist at Emory University. “That gets lowered significantly if people get boosted.”

One reason older adults may benefit from an additional booster shot is because as the immune system ages, it tends to weaken and does not produce the same quantity or quality of antibodies as it did when it was younger. On top of that, older adults often have other medical conditions that take up the body’s attention, putting them at higher risk of severe disease, said Dr. Christian Gaebler, an immunology researcher at Rockefeller University in New York City. “Diabetes, hypertension, obesity and chronic kidney disease are all risk factors for severe Covid,” he said. “And we know that these usually manifest in older age.”

In their justification for seeking second boosters for people 65 and up, Pfizer and BioNTech relied heavily on evidence from two studies conducted in Israel that suggested that people who had received fourth shots were less likely to become infected with the virus compared with those who had received three doses.

In one study, published on a preprint server in February, scientists reviewed the health records of about 1.1 million people over 60 who had received a fourth dose and compared them with those who had received just three doses. They found that the rate of confirmed infections, as well as that of severe illness, was lower in people who had gotten their fourth shot.

The second study, published Wednesday in The New England Journal of Medicine, looked at Israeli health care workers of all ages and found that both Pfizer’s and Moderna’s fourth shots bolstered antibody levels, though they were not very good at preventing infection.

Experts, however, cautioned that the available data is still preliminary and has not yet shown how long the benefits of a fourth dose will last.

If the shots are authorized for seniors, how should they think about timing them?

Experts tracking Covid-19 are careful not to give specific advice on when to get a fourth dose when the safety and efficacy data are still limited.

If another surge is just around the corner, for instance, seniors may benefit from getting an extra shot as soon as it’s authorized. But if the next wave doesn’t occur until the summer or even the fall, getting a booster now could backfire because the recipients’ immunity might start to wane by the time they need protection the most. Current vaccines are based on the original strain of the coronavirus, so getting a booster now may also do little to protect against future variants.

“It would be great if we knew exactly when the next wave was going to be so we could vaccinate people beforehand,” said Dr. Amy Sherman, an infectious disease physician at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. “But I think we’re not quite at the point where we know a clear seasonality, and we know the exact tempo and dynamics of Covid and newer variants.”

That being said, if a fourth shot is authorized for adults over 65, and it has already been several months since they got their first booster, “I would start thinking about whether I need a booster now,” Dr. del Rio said.

What does this mean for everyone else?

For people younger than 65, who are otherwise healthy, most experts agree that three doses are most likely enough for now. Those in their 20s and 30s who have already received three shots of the vaccine, for instance, will only see marginal benefits in protection from an additional shot, Dr. Gaebler said.

“Fourth doses might turn out to be advisable,” he said, “but at this point I think the focus should be on administering third doses.”

Dr. del Rio agreed. “I’m more concerned about the millions of Americans who are not vaccinated or are only partially vaccinated,” he said. “That, to me, is where we need to put our major focus.” Getting more people vaccinated, nationally and globally, could potentially have a bigger effect on reducing virus transmission and curtailing new variants so that everyone can return to normal life, Dr. del Rio said.

And there is hope that better vaccines and treatments are on the way. Pfizer and Moderna are testing new Omicron-specific versions of the Covid booster. And other researchers are investigating vaccines that boost mucosal immunity in the nose, as well as protein-based shots that may be better at protecting against the coronavirus in the future.

“We have to really think carefully about our vaccine strategies,” Dr. Sherman said. “We have to think as a society about what our goal is with repeated boosters and vaccines because none of our existing vaccines completely prevent transmission or prevent all disease. And so at what point are we comfortable with asymptomatic or mild infection in the population while still being able to protect those who are vulnerable?”
https://www.nytimes.com/article/4th-cov ... oster.html

The Pandemic hasn't gone away and new mRNA vaccines are still in the testing phase. Pfizer is requesting EUA for a 4th dose/2nd booster for adults 65 and over and Moderna is requesting EUA for a 4th dose/2nd booster for all adults, the FDA is evaluating them. For me it's been 6 month since my booster (3rd dose).
Last edited by highdesert on Mon Mar 21, 2022 12:39 am, edited 1 time in total.
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." - Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Re: New SARS type virus spreading in China

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Report: Largest Study Yet Shows Ivermectin Failed to Reduce Covid Hospitalizations

Antiparasitic drug Ivermectin became a partisan battleground during the Covid-19 pandemic, as anti-vaccine influencers and Republican politicians hawked it as a miracle cure, to the widespread skepticism of infectious disease experts.

A peer-reviewed study recently presented by Dr. Edward Mills, a professor of health sciences at McMaster University in Canada, offered significant new evidence that ivermectin was coronavirus snake oil all along.

In the largest trial yet analyzing the effectiveness of ivermectin on treating the coronavirus, Mills and his fellow researchers found that Covid-19 patients at risk of severe illness who received ivermectin did no better than those prescribed a placebo, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday.

“This is the first large, prospective study that should really help put to rest ivermectin and not give any credibility to the use of it for Covid-19,” Peter Hotez, dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine, told the Journal.

Of the 1,358 patients, researchers prescribed half a three-day course of ivermectin pills, and the other half with a placebo. They then tracked how many patients were hospitalized over the course of four weeks, how quickly the patients rid the virus from their bodies, and death rates, among other variables. The researchers parsed the data in a variety of different ways and found no instances where ivermectin impacted patient outcomes.

Earlier in the pandemic, some researchers hypothesized that ivermectin could help, after a few studies appeared to show a benefit. However, research consistently failed to validate these earlier findings, and many of the original studies that started the ivermectin craze were discovered to have employed flawed methods. Nevertheless, ivermectin remained a favored treatment among the hardline, anti-vaccine flank of the Republican Party, many of whom continued to take the drug even as medical experts warned that there was no hard evidence it worked.

My colleague Kiera Butler has followed the strange journey of ivermectin from its beginnings as the follow-up act to the discredited Trump-touted malaria drug hydroxychloroquine. In January she wrote that doctors had known for more than a year that the antiparasitic drug wasn’t effective against Covid, and that the FDA had explicitly warned against prescribing it to Covid patients.

But, nevertheless, many physicians continued to prescribe the drug anyway, exacting real costs to the public in the form of sky-high insurance and Medicare expenditures: “What’s more,” Kiera wrote, “anti-vaccine activists often tout ivermectin as an alternative to vaccines—yet many Covid patients who have opted for ivermectin and other untested treatments instead of vaccines have required lengthy and expensive hospital stays.”
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/20 ... lizations/

Maybe I will start a rumor that a combination of Sucrose and NaCl tablets can cure Covid 19 and they are only $20 a tablet. Don't wait stock up now. I bet for a cut of the action I could get Steve Bannon, Alex Jones and TOT to hawk them for me.:sarcasm:
Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored.-Huxley
"We can have democracy in this country, or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both." ~ Louis Brandeis,

Re: New SARS type virus spreading in China

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The Food and Drug Administration is poised to authorize a second coronavirus vaccine booster for anyone 50 and older, a bid to provide an extra layer of protection amid concerns Europe’s rise in infections from an omicron subvariant could hit the United States, according to several government officials.

The authorizations for second Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna boosters could be announced as soon as Tuesday, according to the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not permitted to discuss the situation. They said talks continue, and it was possible, but unlikely, that major changes could occur.

After the FDA acts, Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is expected to issue a statement saying second boosters are available for eligible individuals interested in receiving them but not to explicitly recommend that.

People will be able to get a second booster at least four months after receiving the first booster. Currently, second boosters are recommended only for people whose immune systems are impaired, which can hamper an effective response to the vaccine.

The question of additional boosters has sparked days of discussion among health officials in the Biden administration and debate within the wider scientific community. Administration officials, as with past vaccine decisions, have struggled to decipher intriguing but frequently evolving data, often from Israel; a political environment in which large swaths of the American population are ambivalent — or in come cases, hostile — toward vaccines; and uncertainty about whether the highly transmissible omicron subvariant BA.2 poses a major threat.

The authorizations appear unlikely to prompt large numbers of older Americans to rush to get a second booster. Data suggests that vaccine fatigue has set in for many, even among some of the most vulnerable. About two-thirds of those 65 and older that are eligible for boosters have received them, according to the CDC. Overall, U.S. vaccination and booster rates are lower than in many Western European nations — which nevertheless have experienced a sharp rise in cases in recent weeks and months.

In deciding to make fourth shots of the mRNA vaccines available for people 50 and older, the FDA considered and then rejected several alternatives. Officials described the discussions among administration health experts as lively but not antagonistic, with an effort to come to a unified position that could be clearly explained to the American people.

“There really was not a lot of debate there,” said one of the officials, adding that Walensky and the new FDA commissioner, Robert M. Califf, both supported the 50 and older approach.

There were initial differences among the agencies, however.

FDA officials favored second boosters for older people in part because of concerns about the spread of BA.2. The omicron subvariant accounts for about 35 percent of new cases in the United States, according to the CDC. In some parts of the country, BA.2 is the cause of more than 70 percent of new cases, according to a genomics testing company.

In contrast, CDC officials raised questions about whether second boosters were an immediate necessity. A recent CDC study showed that the vaccinations and boosters most commonly used in the United States provided robust protection for older and younger people against death or needing mechanical ventilation, even as protection against mild illness waned over time.

The discussions started by focusing on a threshold of 65, because that was the age in the authorization request for the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. Moderna asked the agency to allow adults 18 and older to receive a second booster.

Health officials also considered greenlighting boosters for people 60 and older to coincide with the data from Israel, which recently made fourth shots available for that age group, and has supplied a good deal of the available data on second boosters.

Some officials at the CDC and elsewhere in the administration expressed concern that setting the bar at 60 or 65 would prevent access to second boosters by younger members of medically underserved groups, including Latinos and Blacks. These groups have higher rates of underlying medical conditions at younger ages and have been disproportionately hurt by the pandemic. The life expectancy of Black Americans is shorter than that for White Americans.

In a pivotal meeting Wednesday night, attended by representatives of the major health agencies, officials agreed to set the age at 50. The decision to lower the age to 50 addressed a health equity concern, and also a desire to avoid the confusion that followed earlier administration efforts to describe which individuals with underlying medical conditions were eligible for an initial booster shot.

On Thursday came news that reinforced the move to provide second boosters to older people.

An Israeli study, not yet peer-reviewed, in more than half a million adults 60 to 100 years old found that a second booster provided significant protection against death from covid-19. Of 328,597 people who received a second booster during a 40-day study period early this year, 92 recipients died; among the 234,868 who had only one booster, 232 people died.

“Our study demonstrates that among the older adult population that had received a first booster dose at least four months earlier, mortality due to covid-19 during the omicron surge was significantly lower among those who had received an additional booster dose,” said researchers from Ben-Gurion University.


Unlike with some past vaccine decisions, the CDC will not directly recommend the second booster in part because the data is not robust, especially in the younger-than-60 group. The agency wants to give permission for a second booster to people who desire that. If officials conclude later that an annual coronavirus booster will be needed in the fall for the broader population, the agency could issue a recommendation.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2 ... urth-shot/

If the FDA and the CDC approve the 2nd booster (4th dose) on Tuesday, I'll head to the pharmacy on Wednesday for mine.
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." - Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Re: New SARS type virus spreading in China

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Same here. Been chomping at the bit for another booster!! I want to avoid horse worm pills, drinking Lysol, injecting Clorox, AND REALLY don't want the UV lights up my anus. LOL
"Being Republican is more than a difference of opinion - it's a character flaw." "COVID can fix STUPID!"
The greatest, most aggrieved mistake EVER made in USA was electing DJT as POTUS.

Re: New SARS type virus spreading in China

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Wino wrote: Sun Mar 27, 2022 11:20 am Same here. Been chomping at the bit for another booster!!
My three doses to date have been Pfizer, I'm thinking of getting a Moderna one for my 4th dose/2nd booster. Sometime this year the new COVID mRNA vaccines should be out, but until then. I'm over six months since my 1st booster (3rd dose).
Study after study has shown that people who receive two different COVID-19 vaccines generate potent immune responses, with side effects no worse than those caused by standard regimens.
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586- ... 0regimens.
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." - Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Re: New SARS type virus spreading in China

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Wino wrote: Tue Feb 22, 2022 10:34 am Bless their little minds - no horse sense at all. LOL

https://arstechnica.com/science/2022/02 ... -politics/

https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/medica ... ar-AAU7eps
The MSN article points out that we are still seeing over 2000 Covid-19 deaths per DAY.

No real biggie since that is only about 23 times as many daily deaths as from vehicular accidents.

I'm not sure why there's all the fuss about Covid.
To be vintage it must be older than me!
The next gun I buy will be the next to last gun I ever buy. PROMISE!
jim

Re: New SARS type virus spreading in China

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The Food and Drug Administration has authorized fourth Pfizer and Moderna Covid vaccine doses for everyone age 50 and older, amid uncertainty over whether an even more contagious version of omicron will cause another wave of infection in the U.S. as it has in Europe and China.

The FDA also said it authorized a second Pfizer booster shot for people age 12 and older who have compromised immune systems, and a second Moderna booster for adults ages 18 and older with compromised immune systems. The new boosters are administered at least fourth months after the last shot.

The FDA made the decision without a meeting of its vaccine advisory committee, a rare move the agency has made more frequently over the course of the pandemic to expand uses of already-approved Covid vaccines. The drug regulator’s authorization comes just two weeks after Pfizer and Moderna asked the FDA to permit a second booster shot based on data from Israel. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to quickly sign off on the decision.
Israeli scientists, in a study published last week, found the death rate from omicron was 78% lower in senior citizens 60- to 100-years-old who received a fourth Pfizer dose compared with those who received just three shots. The study, which has not undergone peer review, examined the medical records of more than 500,000 people from January through February at Clalit Health Services, Israel’s largest health-care provider.

The FDA decision to authorize fourth doses for those age 50 and older was broader than Pfizer’s request and narrower than Moderna’s. Pfizer had asked the FDA to clear fourth doses for those age 65 and older, while Moderna asked the drug regulator to permit them for all adults age 18 and older. Moderna CEO Stephane Bancel told CNBC last week that the biotech company filed a broader request in order to give the FDA flexibility to decide which age group needs a fourth dose right now.
The authorization of fourth shots comes as a more contagious omicron subvariant, BA.2, has caused new waves of infection in major European nations and China, which is battling its worst outbreak since 2020. BA.2 has gained ground in the U.S. since February and is expected to become the dominant variant here in the coming weeks. White House chief medical advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci has said infections might increase in the U.S. due to BA.2, though he doesn’t expect another wave.

BA.2 generally does not make people sicker than the earlier version of omicron, BA.1, and the vaccines have the same level of effectiveness against both types of the variant, according to studies from South Africa and Qatar among others. Neither study has undergone peer review.

It’s unclear if the FDA will also approve fourth doses for younger adults at some point, as there’s less data to support such a decision right now. An Israeli study from February among health-care workers ages 18 and older indicated that a fourth dose does not boost immunity but restores it to the peak strength of the third dose. Many people in the study who received a fourth dose still got infected, though they were either asymptomatic or had mild symptoms.

“A fourth vaccination of healthy young health-care workers may have only marginal benefits,” Dr. Gili Regev-Yochay and a team of scientists from Sheba Medical Center and Israel’s Ministry of Health who conducted the study wrote in a letter to the New England Journal of Medicine this month.
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/03/29/fda-aut ... lder-.html


Now just waiting on the CDC, they too can approve it without their advisory committee.
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." - Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Re: New SARS type virus spreading in China

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The Food and Drug Administration on Tuesday authorized an extra dose of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine for that age group and for certain younger people with severely weakened immune systems.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention later recommended the extra shot as an option but stopped short of urging that those eligible rush out and get it right away. That decision expands the additional booster to millions more Americans.
FDA’s Marks said regulators set the age at 50 because that’s when chronic conditions that increase the risks from COVID-19 become more common.

Until now, the FDA had allowed a fourth vaccine dose only for the immune-compromised as young as 12. Vaccines have a harder time revving up severely weak immune systems, and Marks said their protection also tends to wane sooner. Tuesday’s decision allows them another booster, too — a fifth dose. Only the Pfizer vaccine can be used in those as young as 12; Moderna’s is for adults.

What about people who got Johnson & Johnson’s single-dose shot? They already were eligible for one booster of any kind. Of the 1.3 million who got a second J&J shot, the CDC said now they may choose a third dose — either Moderna or Pfizer. For the more than 4 million who got Moderna or Pfizer as their second shot, the CDC says an additional booster is only necessary if they meet the newest criteria — a severely weakened immune system or are 50 or older.

That’s because a CDC study that tracked which boosters J&J recipients initially chose concluded a Moderna or Pfizer second shot was superior to a second J&J dose.
https://apnews.com/article/fda-authoriz ... db620aa1ae
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." - Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Re: New SARS type virus spreading in China

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Just in case y’all missed it, Shanghai, a city of 26,000,000 inhabitants, just got locked down due to Covid-19.

https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/drone-c ... kDU2vQKtrL

Just for reference, all of Metro Los Angeles has less than half that population, with the city of L.A. claiming just under 4 million residents.

And for those interested in “supply chain” issues... Shanghai is China’s largest port.
"It is better to be violent, if there is violence in our hearts, than to put on the cloak of non-violence to cover impotence. There is hope for a violent man to become non-violent. There is no such hope for the impotent." -Gandhi

Re: New SARS type virus spreading in China

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Bisbee wrote: Wed Mar 30, 2022 3:05 pm Just in case y’all missed it, Shanghai, a city of 26,000,000 inhabitants, just got locked down due to Covid-19.

https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/drone-c ... kDU2vQKtrL

Just for reference, all of Metro Los Angeles has less than half that population, with the city of L.A. claiming just under 4 million residents.
I heard about this earlier from a friend. At the time it wasn’t a full lockdown.
Image
Image

"Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated!" Loquacious of many. Texas Chapter Chief Cat Herder.

Re: New SARS type virus spreading in China

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Last I heard Shanghai had 3500 verified COVID cases and the city was shut down. The shut downs are affecting their economy, they won't be overtaking the US for awhile.


Got my 4th dose/2nd booster today. Couldn't find any Moderna, seems everyplace here just has Pfizer. The regular pharmacies have scheduled days and hours for shots, so I got a Pfizer booster at Wally World quick and easy. Their corporate alerted them this am so they brought in a 2nd pharmacist to just do the booster shots.
Mr. Biden, 78, received his second COVID-19 booster shot on camera Wednesday, one day after the Food and Drug Administration authorized a new round of Moderna and Pfizer vaccine doses for Americans over 50. The president, who received his initial booster in September, is one of the 34 million Americans now eligible to receive a second booster shot.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/biden-covi ... covid-gov/
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." - Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Re: New SARS type virus spreading in China

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My 71 year old brother came back from a business trip to San Juan about 3 weeks ago with Covid. Luckily he had all 3 shots and is recovering.

But he's had some serious life-threatening injuries that left permanent damage, along with head injuries. People would ask me: With all those head injuries is, you know, himself? Ok? It there any brain damage?

I'd respond. Well, he's in law school, doing well, and enjoying it. DEFINITELY brain-damaged!

My brother though it was hilarious!
"Even if the bee could explain to the fly why pollen is better than shit, the fly could never understand."

Re: New SARS type virus spreading in China

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sikacz wrote: Wed Mar 30, 2022 7:27 pm How many months was it between the two boosters?
Mine was 6 months, but has to be 4 months for the 2nd booster. I had my CDC card but they checked the state immunization registry.

Edit to add:
“Today, CDC expanded eligibility for an additional booster dose for certain individuals who may be at higher risk of severe outcomes from COVID-19. Boosters are safe, and people over the age of 50 can now get an additional booster 4 months after their prior dose to increase their protection further. This is especially important for those 65 and older and those 50 and older with underlying medical conditions that increase their risk for severe disease from COVID-19 as they are the most likely to benefit from receiving an additional booster dose at this time. CDC, in collaboration with FDA and our public health partners, will continue to evaluate the need for additional booster doses for all Americans.”
https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2022 ... sters.html
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." - Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Re: New SARS type virus spreading in China

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I'm six months out from booster. Trying to set appt, with provider (local grocery pharmacy) on line, but not set up as yet to do on line 2nd booster.

EDIT: Finally got appt. set for 4/1/22 @10:10 AM.
"Being Republican is more than a difference of opinion - it's a character flaw." "COVID can fix STUPID!"
The greatest, most aggrieved mistake EVER made in USA was electing DJT as POTUS.

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