Reportedly, yet another dose of the vaccine for COVID-19 will be necessary in order to prevent further hospitalizations, claimed Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla in a Sunday release.
“Right now, the way that we have seen, it is necessary, a fourth booster right now. The protection that you are getting from the third, it is good enough, actually quite good for hospitalizations and deaths,” stated Bourla while on a segment of “Face the Nation” from CBS.
“It’s not that good against infections but doesn’t last very long. But we are just submitting those data to the FDA [Food and Drug Administration], and then we will see what the experts also will say outside Pfizer,” he continued.
In comments to CNBC this past Saturday, the CEO stated that Pfizer is currently salted to submit their data to the FDA as part of a request for approval of another, now reaching the 4th, dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. “It’s clear that there is a need in an environment of omicron to boost the immune response,” he claimed while making an appearance on CNBC’s “Squawk Box.”
Margaret Brennan, the host of the show, questioned Bourla about if his company could avoid the confusion that came with the announcement of the first booster shot. “I think so. And I think right now we need to be very well coordinated, CDC [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention], FDA and the industry so that we are all providing to the American people and to the world a cohesive picture rather than confusion,” he stated.
As even more random variants of the first SARS -CoV-2 continue to spring up, Bourla stated that Pfizer is continuing to attempt to make a vaccine that is strong enough to counter all of them. “We are working very diligently right now … to make not only a vaccine that will protect against all variants, including Omicron, but also something that can protect for at least a year,” he stated. “And if we be able to achieve that, then I think it is very easy to follow and remember so that we can go back to really the way used to live.”
Masking mandates are currently being dropped by quite a few states, with Hawaii slated to tbe the last on March 26th. Howver, some scientists stated a “stealth” Omicron subvariant, BA.2, has been slowly but steadily creeping across the country.
“Cases of this particular omicron subvariant, one of a few, keep popping up and have roughly doubled the past few weeks in the U.S., according to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data estimates,” reported the Miami Herald recently. “It now makes up 11.6% of overall virus cases as of March 5 since it began doubling as of Feb. 5.”
“All in all, I think we’re really gonna be OK and I don’t think BA.2 is gonna be problematic like omicron,” claimed an infectious disease doctor and professor and chief of the Division of Infectious Diseases at the University of Buffalo, Dr. Thomas Russo, reported the Herald.
“In some parts of the world, the BA.2 subvariant has replaced the original omicron strain, known as BA.1, as the most dominant even as global cases go down, the World Health Organization said in a March 8 statement,” concluded the report.