Booster Shots

Heading into the third fall of the pandemic, Americans will have access to booster shots reformulated to fight omicron sub-variants.

Updated COVID boosters are now available for anyone age 12 or older. The CDC is urging anyone who is eligible to sign up but some vaccine experts say some people might want to wait.

The Food and Drug Administration expanded authorization of Pfizer-BioNTech's COVID vaccine to enable kids ages 5 to 11 who were vaccinated at least five months ago to get a third shot.

People who are 50 and older and certain immunocompromised individuals may get a second Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna COVID-19 vaccine booster four months after they received the first.

While approval would only be for those populations, an infectious disease specialist from Mount Carmel Medical Group says may be good for everyone.

Pfizer and BioNTech are planning to ask the Food and Drug Administration to authorize a second COVID-19 booster shot for people age 65 and older.

Just over half of Ohio adults who are fully vaccinated against the coronavirus have also received a booster shot. An Ohio State University professor blames the lag in part on how the vaccine rolled out in Ohio.

Now, both the Pfizer and the Moderna booster shots can be given five months after the second dose of vaccine — down from six months.

The move to shorten the Pfizer booster interval comes as the U.S. shatters daily case records. The recommended interval for those who received Moderna or Johnson & Johnson vaccines has not changed.

The authorization comes in the midst of an explosion of COVID-19 cases nationwide driven by the omicron variant — a surge that has brought a spike in pediatric hospitalizations.