The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Thursday approved an updated COVID-19 vaccine intended to address severe symptoms of the virus ahead of the cold and flu season.
The Idaho Capital Sun reports the new booster shots from Moderna and Pfizer follow a summer of increasing COVID-19 cases and are designed to better address the variants that are circulating now.
Peter Marks, director of the FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, said these updated vaccines meet the agency’s rigorous, scientific standards for safety, effectiveness, and manufacturing quality,” and “given waning immunity of the population from previous exposure to the virus and from prior vaccination, the FDA strongly encourages those who are eligible to consider receiving an updated COVID-19 vaccine to provide better protection against currently circulating variants.”
Anyone over the age of 12 is eligible for a single dose of the updated vaccine if they’ve been vaccinated previously.
They also must wait at least two months after their last vaccination.
Pfizer wrote in a statement that its “vaccine will begin shipping immediately and be available in pharmacies, hospitals, and clinics across the U.S. beginning in the coming days.”
Moderna said it expects its updated vaccine “to be in pharmacies and care settings in the coming days.”
