Pfizer says it plans to meet with top US health officials Monday to discuss the drugmaker’s request for federal authorization of a third dose of its COVID-19 vaccine, per the AP. The company said it was scheduled to have the meeting with the Food and Drug Administration and other officials Monday, days after Pfizer asserted that booster shots would be needed within 12 months. Pfizer’s Dr. Mikael Dolsten said last week that early data from the company’s booster study suggests people’s antibody levels jump five- to 10-fold after a third dose, compared to their second dose months earlier—evidence it believes supports the need for a booster. On Sunday, Dr. Anthony Fauci didn't rule out the possibility but said it was too soon for the government to recommend another shot.
Fauci said the CDC and the FDA did the right thing last week by pushing back against Pfizer's assertion with their statement that they did not view booster shots as necessary “at this time.” Fauci said clinical studies and laboratory data have yet to fully bear out the need for a booster to the current two-shot Pfizer and Moderna vaccines or the one-shot Johnson & Johnson regimen. “Right now, given the data and the information we have, we do not need to give people a third shot,” he said. “That doesn’t mean we stop there. ... There are studies being done now ongoing as we speak about looking at the feasibility about if and when we should be boosting people.” Israel, meanwhile, is offering Pfizer booster shots to people with weakened immune systems, per the Guardian.
(More
Pfizer stories.)
,
uBlock 
,
and
Ghostery 
)
