With new booster, US starts another vaccine campaign

WASHINGTON (TND) — A new round of booster shots specifically targeted against the omicron variant are now available for free for wide swaths of the population, but will Americans roll up their sleeves?

The new boosters were authorized by the Food and Drug Administration in August and are tailored to protect against the omicron subvariants that have taken hold and the original version of the virus. The shot is approved for people 12 and older as long as two months have passed since their most recent vaccine or booster.

Public health leaders and the federal government started the latest push for vaccination last week at a time where most restrictions on masking, quarantining and social distancing have been lifted and COVID has lost its prominence in everyday life.

President Joe Biden declared the pandemic was over in an interview with “60 Minutes” that aired Sunday night.

"The pandemic is over. We still have a problem with COVID. We're still doing a lot of work on it. It's — but the pandemic is over," Biden said.

Pandemic fatigue and changing mindsets about the need for protection may present an obstacle for doctors and health officials hoping to get patients to take a jab for what could be as many as the fifth time for some. With every round of shots that have been released, America’s uptake has dropped.

According to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 263,415,633 Americans — or 79.3% of the population — have received at least one dose of the vaccine. Nearly 68% of the population is considered fully vaccinated through the two-shot dosage for Pfizer and Moderna shots and the single-shot Johnson & Johnson vaccine. About 109 million fully vaccinated Americans have received a booster dose.

Data on the initial uptake of the omicron-targeted booster is not yet available and the U.S. is still early in the early push to get shots in arms, but trends developed over the pandemic don’t look promising for the new vaccine.

“It seems like we, over time, are dropping our guard and it's not the time to do it — we just can't predict the future,” said Dr. Jon Andrus, professor of global health at George Washington University and former deputy director for the Pan American Health Organization.

The White House, CDC and FDA have released numerous statements highlighting the safety and efficacy of the new vaccine and encouraged everyone to receive a dose. Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff and White House COVID-19 response coordinator Dr. Ashish Jha received the new booster on Friday at a clinic in Washington.

“At a federal-level the Biden administration is taking what they have learned and applying it to this roll-out. They are rolling out another public health campaign aimed at educating people on the need for the booster, with text alerts from pharmacies to encourage boosters, and outreach to leaders in the community to further encourage folks to go out and get the booster,” said Amber Reinhart, associate professor of communication at the University of Missouri-St. Louis.

Federal agencies are making an all-out push to get as many shots into arms as possible, but challenges become more evident as public health systems get more localized. The pandemic laid bare the issues local-level health departments and public health infrastructure face.

Many local health departments struggle with low levels of funding and are understaffed, making it harder to handle outbreaks of diseases like COVID-19.

“Whatever agency you fall under, you try your best to use all the available resources and tools available to get the message out but that then has to be translated down to the local level, and I think that's where we begin to see some challenges,” Andrus said. “Depending on the local public health system, the infrastructure, the staffing and so on. It can be challenging because over time, our public health infrastructure has been crumbling.”

What may present the biggest barrier is COVID fatigue after more than two years of the virus consuming much of the world and way things operate. Most restrictions have been lifted and people have returned to or are on their way back to pre-pandemic routines.

Even though restrictions aren’t as prevalent, health experts have cautioned that the dangers of the virus have not completely eroded. The seven-day moving average of new cases in the U.S. still sat near 61,000 as of Friday, according to CDC data.

“Even with an average of 400 Americans dying every day from COVID people just want to ‘move on’ with their lives and not get another shot,” Reinhart said. “Local health officials will need to combat this feeling with personalized messages that target what the booster can do, how COVID still continues to be something we need to pay attention to, and why people should get the booster. Education, advocating at a person level, and minimizing as many barriers as possible are the best methods we have for increasing the rate of those getting the booster.”

There is some evidence Americans will roll up their sleeves in the coming months. A Morning Consult survey released last week found over half of Americans said they planned to get a booster in the next year and would continue to do so on an annual basis.

Some health experts are also optimistic the onset of flu season will lead more people to get vaccinated against COVID-19 when they go in to get a flu shot, which is much more accepted as an annual practice. Scientists and federal health agencies agree there is no risk to getting the flu shot and the new COVID booster in the same visit.