PARIS, Aug 26 (Reuters) – France plans to roll out COVID-19 vaccine booster shots in nursing homes from September 12 or September 13 onwards, Prime Minister Jean Castex said on Thursday. Meanwhile, people aged over 65 and those will existing medical conditions will be able to book appointments for a booster shot from early September, Castex told RTL radio, adding there must be a six-month delay between the second and the third shot. France’s Haute Autorite de Sante (HAS) health watchdog on Tuesday recommended a COVID-19 vaccine booster shot for those aged 65 and over and for those with existing medical conditions that could put at them serious harm from COVID.
American Airlines warns on August revenue as rising COVID-19 cases hit bookings
Aug 25 (Reuters) – American Airlines (AAL.O) said on Wednesday its August revenue was trending below the U.S. carrier’s internal forecast as a recent uptick in COVID-19 cases led to some softness in bookings. American’s Chief Revenue Officer Vasu Raja, speaking at the Raymond James industrials conference, said the airline was also experiencing a rise in cancellations. COVID-19 cases, driven by the highly infectious Delta variant, have surged in parts of the United States with lower vaccination levels. However, Raja added that the company’s booked business for the holidays remained “incredibly strong”. The carrier expects business demand to likely come back in the transatlantic and Latin American regions, given their proximity to the United States. American shares have risen 26.6% so far this year. The U.S. could get COVID-19 under control by early next year if vaccinations ramp up, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, said on Tuesday, as Pfizer won full FDA approval for its shot, with more potential approvals coming in the weeks ahead.
NY has 12,000 more virus deaths than what Cuomo reported
- Just two days into her administration, NY Gov. Kathy Hochul released new COVID-19 death numbers.
- Hochul updated the state’s tally by adding 12,000 more deaths than were previously reported.
- “Transparency will be the hallmark of my administration,” Hochul said on MSNBC.
New York Governor Kathy Hochul acknowledged an additional 12,000 COVID-19 deaths in New York State that her predecessor, Andrew Cuomo, did not, the Associated Press reported. The new governor said the new tally will increase transparency after former governor Andrew Cuomo was accused of covering up COVID-19 deaths in state nursing homes during the beginning of the pandemic. Beyond the sexual harassment allegations that preceded Cuomo’s resignation, the nursing home death count became one of several scandals that plagued his third term. “We’re now releasing more data than had been released before publicly, so people know the nursing home deaths and the hospital deaths are consistent with what’s being displayed by the CDC,” Hochul said Wednesday on MSNBC. “There’s a lot of things that weren’t happening and I’m going to make them happen,” she continued. “Transparency will be the hallmark of my administration.” Before her bombshell 165-page report that found Cuomo sexually harassed 11 women, New York Attorney General Letitia James accused the former governor of undercounting nursing home deaths by as much as 50%. Cuomo’s top aide at the time, Melissa DeRosa, told lawmakers in a leaked call that the administration was sitting on the nursing home-related death tally as a preemptive measure against a potential federal investigation urged by former President Donald Trump. A March 25, 2020 executive order mandated that nursing home patients who were hospitalized with the COVID-19 should be discharged back to nursing homes, as long as the providers could take adequate care of them. The Cuomo administration insisted they were simply following CDC guidance. Hospital capacity was a primary concern at the time, but the order left nursing home staff in a bind, particularly with the potential for the recently hospitalized residents to spread the virus if they were still within the window of contagiousness. Cuomo accused Trump, Fox News and the New York Post of conspiring against him by running with the story. Questions remain over whether Hochul will fire Howard Zucker, the state health commissioner, who was heavily implicated in the attorney general report on nursing homes. Our goal is to create a safe and engaging place for users to connect over interests and passions. In order to improve our community experience, we are temporarily suspending article commenting.
US food suppliers are having trouble keeping shelves stocked
If you’ve been to a grocery store lately, you’ve probably noticed that a lot of your favorite items are either missing or low in stock. In some cases, entire stretches of grocery stores are bare. Why are grocery stores having so much trouble stocking their shelves? Unless you’ve taken social distancing to the extreme and have completely shut down the outside world, then you know that the current coronavirus (also known as COVID-19) pandemic is escalating every day. People who are worried about the future have been panic-buying everything from toilet paper to water, either because they’re worried about potentially being quarantined or because they don’t want to face a shortage of goods. Ironically, it’s this panic-buying that is leading to a shortage of goods in the first place. Stores like Walmart are cutting their hours and putting purchase limits on high-demand items, but household staples are still flying off the shelves. This may lead some people to think that food production is slowing down, but that simply isn’t the case. “There is food being produced,” Julie Anna Potts, chief executive of the North American Meat Institute, told The New York Times. “There is food in warehouses. There is plenty of food in the country.”
US economic growth slowing… It’s the Delta
The highly transmissible Delta variant of COVID-19 now makes up an overwhelming majority of the new cases in the U.S., bringing with it a rise in cases and hospitalizations. Widespread vaccine distribution and distancing measures have helped limit the variant’s impact, but we could still see some drag on economic growth as some restrictions are reintroduced and consumers potentially become more cautious. While we may see an increase in market volatility due to the Delta variant, we believe the S&P 500 is still likely to see more gains through the end of the year. Despite the increased transmissibility of Delta and the increased health threat for those who aren’t vaccinated, our understanding of the measures needed to contain COVID-19 is in an entirely different place than it was in 2020. Above all else, we have not just one but several vaccines, which drastically reduces the risk from the variant, although it can’t completely eliminate it. We understand the effectiveness of masks in limiting transmission. Treatments have improved. We also know that the virus is not easily transmitted by touching surfaces—especially with simple good practices around handwashing—limiting the need for certain restrictions. Because of that, deaths from COVID remain near the lowest level of the pandemic despite the pick-up in cases . Much of that is due to the vaccines’ ability to limit serious cases, though health risks remain high for those who aren’t vaccinated. We are also seeing some strain on healthcare systems in regions with low vaccination rates.
Our view has consistently been that governments should, and generally will, impose restrictions only to the degree necessary to protect the most vulnerable and keep our healthcare system from getting overwhelmed. There’s not a clean, scientific answer to exactly what that point is, but there is a solid set of guidelines. If individuals, businesses, and officials use those guidelines as appropriate for their communities, there will still likely be some added drag on economic growth—but we think it will be manageable, with the drag still outweighed by the on-going rebound.We do think third-quarter GDP forecasts could fall a few percentage points, the lost growth being pushed back into late 2021 and early 2022. But even if the impact was so strong that we saw modest economic contraction, which we view as unlikely, we would expect the economy to bounce back quickly. Any drag on economic growth would likely come from a few key sources: Changes in individual behavior due to safety concerns will probably have a larger impact than government intervention. This will likely be especially true for those with young children who are not eligible for vaccinations and those who choose not to get vaccinated. Behavioral changes may slow the recovery in the job market in particular if the changing environment places additional childcare demands on parents or raises workplace safety concerns. While the impact from Delta could slow demand growth, it may have a bigger impact on the supply side. Some countries where vaccine availability has been low have already imposed added restrictions, which could limit factory activity, exacerbate shortages, and create added price pressures. The economy has been slowly starting to work its way through supply/demand imbalances, but this may negate some of the progress, putting a temporary cap on growth. While some people may still choose to remain unvaccinated, it’s hard to ignore the extreme risk disparities between those who are vaccinated and those who aren’t as Delta has spread. Delta’s greater transmissibility does mean “herd immunity” will be harder to achieve, but there does seem to be progress. Europe has been battling Delta longer than the U.S. it’s clear that the Delta variant could create significant added economic strain if left unchecked, Equity markets almost universally like stimulus even if there might be potential long-term negative consequences. Delta has already pushed back expectations of the first Federal Reserve rate hike. Market-based expectations had been pulled forward to 2022 as U.S. growth surprised to the upside, but have now been pushed back again to 2023. The Biden administration’s stimulus plans may also receive greater support if the economy stumbles due to Delta, and we could even see some added COVID-oriented measures. Even if the stimulus comes with a long-term cost, it is likely to be viewed as market positive in the near term due to the added safety net it provides. Even with heightened restrictions in place, individuals and businesses will be reluctant to completely lose reopening momentum. Of course, it’s not completely in their control. There is rising concern over the Delta variant, and people will be more cautious on average. Global vaccine distribution has a long way to go. Meanwhile, vaccine availability is high in the U.S. there are still increased risks to growth and we may see market volatility.
COVID jab protection wanes within six months – UK researchers
COVID-19 protection from two doses of the Pfizer or AstraZeneca vaccines begins to wane within six months, new research suggests.
In a reasonable “worst-case scenario”, protection could fall to below 50% for the elderly and healthcare workers by winter, analysis from the Zoe COVID study found.
The Pfizer-BioNTech jab was 88% effective at preventing coronavirus infection a month after the second dose.
But the protection decreased to 74% after five to six months – suggesting protection fell 14 percentage points in four months.
Meanwhile, protection from the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine fell to 77% just one month after the second dose. It decreased to 67% after four to five months – suggesting protection fell by 10 percentage points over three months. The vast study involved more than 1.2 million test results and participants, though the vaccines were not trialled against the now dominant Delta variant of the virus. Pfizer’s mid-term efficacy trial observed an initial 96.2% risk reduction in infection up to two months after the second dose. There was an 83.7% reduction around four months after the second dose – a 12.5 percentage point increase in risk of infection. COVID vaccines were rolled out across the UK among the older and the most vulnerable in society along with health workers first, before being given to younger age groups. So the majority of people who had their second dose five to six months ago will be older or considered vulnerable due to other health reasons – suggesting they are now likely to be at increased risk of COVID-19 compared to those vaccinated more recently.
Professor Tim Spector, lead scientist on the Zoe COVID Study app, said: “In my opinion, a reasonable worst-case scenario could see protection below 50% for the elderly and healthcare workers by winter.
“If high levels of infection in the UK, driven by loosened social restrictions and a highly transmissible variant, this scenario could mean increased hospitalisations and deaths”. He said that we “urgently need to make plans for vaccine boosters” as well as decide if a strategy to vaccinate children is sensible if the aim is to reduce deaths and hospital admissions. Prof Spector continued: “Waning protection is to be expected and is not a reason to not get vaccinated. “Vaccines still provide high levels of protection for the majority of the population, especially against the Delta variant, so we still need as many people as possible to get fully vaccinated.” The Zoe COVID Study launched an app feature last December to enable logging of coronavirus vaccines and monitor real-world side-effects and effectiveness in its cohort of over a million users. It used data from vaccines which were recorded from 8 December 2020 to 3 July 2021, and from infections that occurred between 26 May this year when the Delta variant became dominant, and 31 July. The study’s results were slightly adjusted to give an average risk of infection reduction across the population. Researchers claim that while protection appears to decrease steadily, the individual risk may vary due to individual variation in antibody duration.
US epidemiologist explains why vaccines alone won’t stop Delta Coronavirus and other mutations
Last week booster shots were approved—and are now available—to people with compromised immune systems, thanks to action taken by the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as evidence mounts that the efficacy of COVID-19 vaccines wane over time. This week, plans are in the works to offer booster shots come October to other higher-risk populations in the United States, including infection preventionists and other health care professionals, residents in nursing homes, and Americans aged 60 or older. In other words, the booster shots will be offered in more or less the same order in which the original vaccines were distributed. But as Sakia V Popescu, PhD, MPH, MA, CIC, a member of Infection Control Today®’s (ICT®’s) Editorial Advisory Board (EAB) wrote in the December 2020 issue of ICT®, effective infection prevention and control should follow the Swiss cheese model championed by virologist Ian Mackay, PhD. Popescu wrote: “In one succinct image, this captures what we do in infection prevention—stress the additive layers that are needed to reduce the spread of infection. From masking to government messaging and vaccines, these layers all work cohesively to reduce the risk of not only COVID-19 infection, but also transmission. Really, this is a concept we have been reinforcing and growing in the field of infection prevention—a wholistic approach to disease prevention.”
Talk about booster shots over the weekend grabbed headlines. Francis Collins, MD, PhD, the director of the National Institutes of Health, said of the delta virus that “this is going very steeply upward with no signs of having peaked out,” according to the Associated Press (AP). The US saw an average of 129,000 new infections a day over the last seven days, according to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center. That’s a 700% increase from the beginning of July and the number could rise to 200,000, which has not been seen since the January/February surge. Thanks to the vaccines, we will not see the horrendous death rates of those surges.
But as ICT® EAB member Kevin Kavanagh, MD, has argued for over year, mortality isn’t the only metric that needs to be taken into account. For instance, medical experts still don’t know exactly what the long-term effects of COVID-19 are. In a recent interview with ICT®, Kavanagh pointed out that “COVID-19 is not just respiratory, it affects every organ of the body. This is a serious type of infection. And we need to be focusing on trying to keep this virus from spreading, plus protecting our young.”
Anthony Fauci, MD, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and President Biden’s chief medical advisor, said that “if it turns out as the data come in, we see we do need to give an additional dose to people in nursing homes, actually, or people who are elderly, we will be absolutely prepared to do that very quickly. But that won’t be enough, Kavanagh argues in an article scheduled to be printed in an upcoming issue of ICT®. “SARS-CoV-2 has continued to evolve,” Kavanagh writes. “It has now become evident that with each emerging variant, the virus has appeared to progressively become more infective. Variants which increase viral load may also increase transmissibility and the opportunity to mutate, along with overwhelming a host’s immune system and becoming more virulent.” And there seems to be wave after wave of variants.
But as Sakia V Popescu, PhD, MPH, MA, CIC, a member of Infection Control Today®’s (ICT®’s) Editorial Advisory Board (EAB) wrote in the December 2020 issue of ICT®, effective infection prevention and control should follow the Swiss cheese model championed by virologist Ian Mackay, PhD. Popescu wrote: “In one succinct image, this captures what we do in infection prevention—stress the additive layers that are needed to reduce the spread of infection. From masking to government messaging and vaccines, these layers all work cohesively to reduce the risk of not only COVID-19 infection, but also transmission. Really, this is a concept we have been reinforcing and growing in the field of infection prevention—a wholistic approach to disease prevention.” Talk about booster shots over the weekend grabbed headlines. Francis Collins, MD, PhD, the director of the National Institutes of Health, said of the delta virus that “this is going very steeply upward with no signs of having peaked out,” according to the Associated Press (AP). The US saw an average of 129,000 new infections a day over the last seven days, according to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center. That’s a 700% increase from the beginning of July and the number could rise to 200,000, which has not been seen since the January/February surge. Thanks to the vaccines, we will not see the horrendous death rates of those surges. But as ICT® EAB member Kevin Kavanagh, MD, has argued for over year, mortality isn’t the only metric that needs to be taken into account. For instance, medical experts still don’t know exactly what the long-term effects of COVID-19 are. In a recent interview with ICT®, Kavanagh pointed out that “COVID-19 is not just respiratory, it affects every organ of the body. This is a serious type of infection. And we need to be focusing on trying to keep this virus from spreading, plus protecting our young.” Anthony Fauci, MD, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and President Biden’s chief medical advisor, said that “if it turns out as the data come in, we see we do need to give an additional dose to people in nursing homes, actually, or people who are elderly, we will be absolutely prepared to do that very quickly. But that won’t be enough, Kavanagh argues in an article scheduled to be printed in an upcoming issue of ICT®.
“SARS-CoV-2 has continued to evolve,” Kavanagh writes. “It has now become evident that with each emerging variant, the virus has appeared to progressively become more infective. Variants which increase viral load may also increase transmissibility and the opportunity to mutate, along with overwhelming a host’s immune system and becoming more virulent.” And there seems to be wave after wave of variants.
Source: World Health Organization
Kavanagh adds that “to make matters worse, SARS-CoV-2 is infecting a number of animals, including cats, large cats, dogs and gorillas. Most recently, concern has been raised that it may have found an animal host in white tail deer, with SARS-CoV-2 antibodies identified in 40% of surveyed animals.” Peter Hotez, MD, PhD, professor of the departments of pediatrics, molecular virology & microbiology and health policy scholar at Baylor College of Medicine, tells ICT®’s sister publication Contagion that recent data has indeed suggested that COVID-19 vaccine-induced immunity from infection is “not as high as it was.” It remains unclear whether that is due to waning immunity or decreased vaccine effectiveness versus the delta variant—a matter which is difficult to discern because the delta outbreak is occurring well into the post-vaccination phase for most adults in the US. “Right now, the data are showing that the protective efficacy against hospitalization and deaths are holding, but the question is will that start to slip over time as well, and at what point do we pull the trigger?” Hotez said. “And how generalizable do we make it—do we keep it restricted over a certain age, are there other criteria, or do we just open it up the whole population?”
Kavanagh has always said that COVID-19 vaccines alone are not a panacea in stopping the pandemic. And although booster shots are crucially important, one should also not rely on booster shots alone, either. There must be a multi-pronged approach to COVID-19 if we have any hope of returning to our pre-COVID normal lives, Kavanagh writes in his article. That includes:
- Upgrade recommendations for mask usage and to use N95 or KN95 masks whenever possible.
- Everyone who can needs to become vaccinated. Similar to Israel, we should fast track approval for mRNA boosters to those who are at higher risk, including those who are immunosuppressed and over the age of 60 and 5 months out from vaccination.
- Upgrade building ventilation systems to increase air exchanges and air sanitization.
- Expand testing capabilities to be able to test frontline workers and school children at least twice a week, and other workers at least once a week.
- Limiting sizes of gatherings, including podding in schools and plans for permanent hybrid instruction to limit class sizes.
- Businesses, including restaurants, need to offer online ordering along with curbside pickup and when possible, home delivery.
- Everyone needs to be vaccinated. Mandatory vaccines should be required in many settings, including health care. Vaccine passports or green cards are being implemented in Israel and France and need to be implemented in the United States.
Carnival Cruise Passenger Dies of Covid Amid Uptick in Cases
As the highly contagious Delta variant surges across the world, the health and safety protocols established for cruise ships are being put to the test. Over two weeks in late July and early August, 27 coronavirus infections were identified aboard the Carnival Vista cruise ship sailing out of Galveston, Texas.
One of those infected, a passenger, later died.
It was the highest number of cases aboard a ship reported since June, when cruises restarted in the Caribbean and United States, and the first death. The passenger and 26 crew members were immediately isolated after testing positive for the virus. Contact tracing and further testing was conducted, with no new cases reported by Aug. 11, when the ship arrived at the port of Belize City on the northeastern coast of Central America, Carnival said. Though the ship sailed out of Texas, which bans businesses from requiring vaccinations, more than 96 percent of passengers were vaccinated and all but one crew member was fully vaccinated, according to the Belize tourism board. Most infected crew members were either asymptomatic or experienced mild symptoms of the virus, but Marilyn Tackett, a 77-year-old passenger from Oklahoma, was admitted to the hospital in Belize and put on a ventilator after experiencing respiratory complications. Days later, she was evacuated to a hospital in Tulsa where she received treatment, but on Aug. 14 her condition worsened, and she died, according to a statement issued by her family on a crowdfunding page set up to help pay for her care. Ms. Tackett’s family declined to comment on the incident. “We are very sorry to hear about the death of a guest who sailed on Carnival Vista,” the Carnival Cruise Line said in a statement. The cruise line said that it was highly unlikely Ms. Tackett contracted the coronavirus aboard the ship, which left Galveston on July 31, and that she had received expert medical care onboard before being evacuated. The cruise line did not test vaccinated passengers before they embarked for the cruise.
Last week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a new advisory, warning people with increased risk for severe illness from Covid-19 to avoid travel on cruise ships, irrespective of their vaccination status.
Carnival is not the only cruise line to have seen an uptick in cases. Earlier this month, Royal Caribbean had six guests test positive onboard its Adventure of the Seas ship. The companies have responded to the recent increase in cases by introducing pre-departure testing requirements for all passengers. Carnival also added a mask mandate on Aug. 7 for all vaccinated and unvaccinated guests in indoor areas and banned smoking in the casino. “The protocols are designed to flex up and adapt,” said Chris Chiames, the chief communications officer for Carnival Cruise Line, in a telephone interview. “That’s what they’ve done here in the context of their desire to mitigate and minimize the threat of Covid, which is everywhere, unfortunately, and it’s going to remain everywhere for a long time.”
“We never suggested our ships would be Covid free,” he continued. “But we designed our protocols to meet and exceed the guidelines of the C.D.C. and we will continue to be vigilant while continuing to focus on giving our guests a great vacation.”
Michael Bayley, the chief executive officer of Royal Caribbean, said the cruise line was typically seeing one or two positive cases out of more than 1,000 guests a week per ship. More than 90 percent of passengers are vaccinated, he said, and because of preboarding testing requirements two to 10 guests are prevented from boarding ships each week because they test positive. But, Mr. Bayley said in a candid Facebook post addressing the current coronavirus situation, “Testing captures status at a point of time and if the guest is incubating infection, then the test will miss it.” The vaccinated guests who test positive typically are asymptomatic, he said in the post. Some cruise lines say passengers have canceled amid concerns about the risks of the Delta variant, but many sailings are fully booked through the rest of year because of pent-up demand.
Many cruise enthusiasts with upcoming trips believe that cruise ships are one of the safest ways to travel during the pandemic because of the high percentage of vaccinated passengers and crew, added testing requirements and stringent health and safety measures enforced on board.
“It’s very comforting boarding a cruise ship knowing that most people are vaccinated and everyone is tested,” said Aidan Alexander, 62, an avid cruiser from Florida who has eight sailings booked through 2022. “When you get on a plane or stay in a hotel you don’t know anyone’s vaccination or Covid status and that makes it very difficult to relax and unwind.”
John Ioannidis, an epidemiology professor at Stanford University, disputes that notion. In an airport, on a plane or in a hotel, he said, “you only get exposed for a few hours, whereas on a cruise ship you could get exposed for many days and weeks. It’s a kind of cumulative exposure.”
Ms. Perez said in a telephone interview. “I think it’s getting risker to travel now with the new variants, even on cruises”
Wall St ends higher, Nasdaq notches record closing high on full vaccine approval
NEW YORK, Aug 23 (Reuters) – Wall Street rallied on Monday, and the Nasdaq reached an all-time closing high as sentiment was boosted by full FDA approval of a COVID-19 vaccine and market participants looked ahead to the Jackson Hole Symposium expected to convene later this week. All three major U.S. stock indexes ended the session sharply higher, with surging crude prices, driven by expected demand growth, putting energy shares out front. “This has been the script all along,” said Peter Cardillo, chief market economist at Spartan Capital Securities in New York. “We make new highs, pull back, and then we’re off to the races again.” “That tells me the fundamentals are in place,” Cardillo added. “There’s worries out there, but it’s hard to keep this market down.” The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted full approval to the COVID-19 vaccine developed by Pfizer Inc and BioNTech SE in a move that could accelerate inoculations in the United States. “Full approval means that there’s most likely going to be more mandates, more companies will mandate that you have to get the vaccine in order to get back to the office,” Cardillo said. “I don’t think this will get all the doubters vaccinated but this news today will probably drive (the vaccinated rate) closer to 75%.” Pfizer and U.S.-listed shares of BioNTech advanced, as did rival Moderna Inc. Spiking COVID-19 infections caused by the highly contagious Delta variant have fueled concerns over a protracted recovery from the global health crisis. Data released on Monday painted a mixed portrait of an economy inching back to normal in the wake of the most abrupt contraction in history. Sales of pre-owned homes unexpectedly increased in July, according to the National Association of Realtors, while a report from IHS Markit showed business activity accelerating this month. The “Goldilocks” portrait of an economic recovery headed in the right direction, but not robust enough to warrant a change in the Federal Reserve’s dovish monetary policy, helped feed investor risk appetite.
Market participants look to the Jackson Hole Symposium, due to convene in Wyoming later this week. Fed Chairman Jerome Powell’s comments will be closely parsed for clues regarding the central bank’s policy-tightening timeline.
Unofficially, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 215.63 points, or 0.61%, to 35,335.71, the S&P 500 gained 37.84 points, or 0.85%, to 4,479.51 and the Nasdaq Composite added 227.99 points, or 1.55%, to 14,942.65.
Pfizer jab gets FDA’s full approval
The Food and Drug Administration on Monday announced that it had approved Pfizer and BioNTech’s Covid-19 vaccine, opening the door to more widespread vaccine mandates as schools and universities begin their academic years. The approval comes eight months after the FDA issued Pfizer its first emergency-use authorization for a Covid-19 vaccine on Dec. 11. Since then, more than 204 million doses of the vaccine have been administered in the U.S. alone. On Monday, the FDA’s acting commissioner, Dr. Janet Woodcock, said the approval should boost public confidence in the Pfizer vaccine.
“As the first FDA-approved Covid-19 vaccine, the public can be very confident that this vaccine meets the high standards for safety, effectiveness, and manufacturing quality the FDA requires of an approved product,” Woodcock said in a statement.
The agency approved the vaccine in people aged 16 and older. Emergency-use authorization remains in place for those aged 12 to 15. A third dose for immunocompromised individuals is also still authorized, but not yet approved. “I am hopeful this approval will help increase confidence in our vaccine, as vaccination remains the best tool we have to help protect lives and achieve herd immunity,” Pfizer’s CEO, Albert Bourla, said in a statement after the approval was announced. Pfizer shares were up 3.9% Monday morning, while BioNTech’s American depositary receipt was up 9.9%. Moderna (MRNA) shares also climbed 5.5%. Emergency-use authorization is short of the full approval that most vaccines and therapeutics must receive before they can be administered to patients. The FDA and Pfizer have been working toward full approval for months. Neither of the other two Covid-19 vaccines to be authorized in the U.S., from Moderna and Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), has received full approval. Approval of the Pfizer vaccine won’t change much for the hundred million people in the U.S. who have already received it. It could, however, ease the way for businesses and institutions seeking to require vaccination as a condition of returning to in-person work or school. Speaking on CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday, Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy said full approval could allow for more vaccine mandates. “For businesses and universities that have been thinking about putting vaccine requirements in place in order to create safer spaces for people to work and learn, I think that this move from the FDA, when it comes, will actually help them to move forward with those kinds of plans,” Murthy said. While some vaccine mandates have already been put in place, others have waited on full FDA approval. The Department of Defense, the world’s largest employer, has said it plans to require Covid-19 vaccines for members of the military once the FDA approval is in place. Though there have been legal challenges to vaccine mandates, they have been met with little success in the courts. The Supreme Court in mid-August declined to intercede in a challenge brought by students at Indiana University. The long-term outlook for the pandemic is making a long-lasting and robust market for Covid-19 vaccine boosters look increasingly likely, a bullish sign for the current leading Covid-19 vaccine makers.