Pfizer, Moderna and Novavax are slated to deliver new single-strain Covid shots targeting the omicron subvariant XBB.1.5 in September.
IMO, if they’re going to make a push for it to be an annual thing, it would be a good idea if the shot were available before school starts in the fall.
They want you to be the most protected during winter.
This is true, but we also know that kids are a disease vector that especially kicks in after every break, and that adults seem to be more vulnerable than kids.
Messaging on this would suck, but I’d love to see split vaccinations, with kids getting vaccinated in late August. That way, they’re less likely to vector the disease and we might tamp down the winter surge, and their ‘prime’ resistance would run through Christmas. And adults getting vaccinated at the end of October, with their ‘prime’ resistance running from just before Thanksgiving through the end of the winter heating season.
That sounds like a really cool thing to try and model and then try all sorts of variations on.
Probably a masters thesis or something in there if someone wanted to do it.
What winter? It stopped snowing where I live that has historically snowed most of my life minus the last few years 😭
Given that all covid vaccines have lost most of their efficacy in just a few months, once a year doesn’t seem like enough.
Considering most people don’t really think about Covid anymore, it certainly isn’t surprising people aren’t going to be scheduling doctor’s visits for it.
I’ll probably get it when I get my flu shot but the messaging and communication isn’t great
I’m actually a little surprised there isn’t a combined influenza/covid vaccine, unless there’s a storage or incompatible carrier issue I’m not aware of (immunology is not my field, so this is entirely possible). As an independent consultant, getting sick pulls money out of my pocket, and being down a week due to flu can cost me $5k or more in income. Plus, I don’t want any of the exciting long term complications, even if rare, from a bout with Covid. I say stick me with a needle and slap my ass on the way out the door.
Current COVID vaccines are mRNA, which is unstable and needs -80⁰C storage. And while there are protein-based vaccines, mRNA are easier to update. So I think we’ll keep getting those while the virus is evolving rapidly.
They don’t all need ultra low temperatures anymore
Moderna can be as warm as -15c
This doesn’t have em all, but it shows they’ve gotten better than the initial ultra low temp requirements.
Good news. Thanks. Still colder than flu but freezers are widespread.
Yeah. Basically, when they were making the vaccines, they were like, Okay, we don’t know exactly how warm we can successfully store them at and have them remain good. But we definitively know that if we store them at this incredibly good temperature, it’ll stay good. Rather than have people dying while we play around with variables when we don’t need to, we’ll just do things at the temperatures we know are good, and we’ll research and figure out the warmer temperatures later on.. And now it’s later on, so …
They are working on mRNA flu vaccines. At least some of point, that’ll be on the market and combinable with the Covid one.
That hasn’t been true for a long time. You can store Moderna/Pfizer at fridge temp for 30 days and 6 months at -25, which is fairly easy to achieve at pharmacies. They just weren’t playing around when they first certified it and removed as many variables as possible. They recertified back in 2021 to allow much warmer temps.
https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/covid-19/info-by-product/moderna/downloads/storage-summary.pdf
Everything has been moving to fast to have one so far, but I honestly thought this fall might be the first year that happens. It’ll happen eventually
‘Cause merica! I’m tougher (tuffer for Americans who can’t read) than Covid heardy dur.
It’s probably more than they don’t think of covid as an ongoing thing. Stuff like wearing masks or having lockdowns isn’t a thing anymore. A lot of things being done to slow COVID have stopped and people feel like it’s over.
That or the shot isn’t covered by government programs anymore.
It was always going to be an annual shot like the flu. That annual flu shot is to combat something that was a pandemic as well. We might even get combo shots at some point.
wait am I on reddit?
Uptake will be lower due to less COVID.
Funny you are getting downvoted for basically paraphrasing exactly what the article said…
And they’re not socialized anymore. It was nice getting my vaccine and boosters without worrying about insurance or paying for them.
Ribbit
