Dr. Rochelle Walensky, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, overruled her agency’s immunization panel early Friday morning by recommending booster shots of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine for frontline workers and people who live in institutional settings like prisons or homeless shelters.
While the move was unusual, one doctor on the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), told The New York Times that their vote was “close.”
In addition, Walensky’s decision aligns the CDC with the Food and Drug Administration’s guidance on boosters for teachers, health care workers, grocery store employees, and others who face increased risk of COVID-19 exposure at where they work or where they live. Both agencies have also endorsed Pfizer boosters for people 65 and older, nursing home residents, and those ages 50 to 64 who have underlying health problems.
“It is my job to recognize where our actions can have the greatest impact,” Walensky said in a statement. “At CDC, we are tasked with analyzing complex, often imperfect data to make concrete recommendations that optimize health. In a pandemic, even with uncertainty, we must take actions that we anticipate will do the greatest good.”
“Walensky did the right thing,” Leana Wen, an emergency physician and public health professor at George Washington University, told POLITICO. “ACIP came out with a shocking, poor recommendation that failed the common sense test. Are we really going to deny an additional level of protection to frontline workers, many of whom got vaccinated eight to nine months ago? It makes much more sense to recommend boosters to those who clearly will benefit.”
The Times reports:
Dr. Walensky’s decision was a boost for President Biden’s campaign to give a broad segment of Americans access to boosters. The White House had come under criticism for getting ahead of the regulatory process.
The White House could begin promoting and rolling out a plan for booster shots as soon as Friday. That would be in keeping with the administration’s previously announced plan to offer the additional doses this week.
“We took a key step in protecting the vaccinated with booster shots, which our top government doctors believe provides the highest level of protection available to date,” Biden said Friday at the White House.
“It’s hard to acknowledge I’m over 65, but I’ll be getting my booster shot,” he added. “It’s a bear, isn’t it?”
Biden said recommendations on Moderna and Johnson & Johnson boosters are forthcoming.
“You still have a high degree of protection,” he said to Americans who have received those jabs. “Our doctors and scientists are working day and night to analyze the data from those two organizations on whether and when you need a booster shot, and we’ll provide updates for you as the process moves ahead.”
Public health officials insist that getting the unvaccinated their first shot is the nation’s top COVID-19 priority. Approximately 36% of the population has yet to get a jab.
