Government
FDA decides to streamline COVID vaccines, what that means for Everyone
By Dana Malcolm
Staff Writer
#USA, February 2, 2023 – In a nine-hour meeting on Thursday, an external advisory panel of experts brought in by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) voted to simplify and regularize vaccine composition so that all COVID shots are similar and focus on targeting the same variants.
Three years into the fight against COVID-19, this will very likely mean the permanent end of the original monovalent
With the advent of Omicron and all the vaccine elusive sub-variants it spawned, the efficacy of those original vaccines plummeted. Bivalent vaccines were quickly developed and with them the FDA and US Centres for Disease Control (CDC) rescind the emergency use and authorization use of the original monovalent as booster shots; effectively barring them from being administered as anything but primary doses for the unvaccinated.
If the FDA accepts this vote it would mean unvaccinated US residents would now be given bivalent primary doses from the get-go. For the North American country which still has a vaccine mandate in place for visitors, it could also prompt tweaking of the definition of fully vaccinated which currently means having a primary series of the monovalent shot.
The decision to simplify the vaccines would pare down the number of vials and measuring healthcare workers have to contend with; a move the FDA is hoping will lead to fewer vaccine administering mistakes as well.
The FDA has not yet made a decision on the once-yearly COVID shot proposal which was also on the table. The attendees cited new concerns brought up in the meeting including the variation of protection needed between healthy people and those with comorbidities and more.