US Coronavirus: With More Covid-19 Recalls On The Horizon, Expert Says Mixing And Matching Doses May Be An Effective Approach

“The mRNA vaccines really should be interchangeable,” she said.

But Wen warned that people who have received the J&J vaccine may need to consider the risks associated with taking her booster dose.

“We know there is an association between the Johnson & Johnson vaccine and a very rare – but extremely serious – blood clotting disorder in women under 50,” Wen told CNN. She added that even though she was fully vaccinated with the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, she would prefer to receive a different vaccine booster.

Dr Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said late last month that “mix and match” studies are underway.

“The mix-and-match study in which you see Moderna as the boost against the other three, that data is now available,” Fauci said during a White House briefing on Covid-19.

The data has not yet been published or submitted to the FDA.

Additionally, some immunocompromised people may be given a third dose, although this is not technically considered a booster, as it is likely that they did not fully respond to the first two doses.

Global infections are down, but experts warn of complacency

Yet experts warn that the primary public health focus must remain on getting initial vaccines into the arms of the millions of Americans who are not vaccinated at all.

“As a country, we are definitely going in the right direction – finally,” said Wen. “The problem, however, is that people really need to watch where they are. Wrong direction.”

Covid-19 infections are down almost 35% from last month, and the number of people fighting the virus in hospitals has fallen by more than 31% from the previous month, according to University data Johns Hopkins and the US Department of Health and Human Services. , respectively.

But experts, including Wen and US Surgeon General Dr Vivek Murthy, warn against complacency as there are still areas showing increasing trends in deaths and hospitalizations.

“Fortunately, we’re seeing fewer cases and fewer hospitalizations, but that’s no reason for us to take our foot off the accelerator or slack off our guards,” Murthy said earlier this week.

In Alabama, infections have declined in recent weeks, but people are still dying from the disease at high rates, a senior state health official said on Friday.

“Very fortunately, we have had a drop in our number of hospitalizations.… We have dropped to just over 1,000 inpatients in the state,” said state health official Dr Scott Harris. He acknowledged that the number was still high, “but it’s about two-thirds less than what we were seeing about a month ago.”

He added: “We haven’t really seen a change in the number of deaths, unfortunately.”

And Pennsylvania reported the highest number of hospitalizations for Covid-19 since February, a spokesperson for the state’s health department said. Of the 3,001 people hospitalized with the virus, 680 were in intensive care units on Thursday, officials said.

Covid-19’s racial and ethnic disparity gap narrows but remains wide

A new analysis released Friday by the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF) shows that the difference in Covid-19 cases and deaths between blacks, Hispanics and whites is narrowing.

KFF researchers found that while disparities are still present between different racial groups, the gap is improving for blacks and Hispanics, based on an analysis of data on the cases and deaths of the CDC last month. But Covid-19 infections remain high among Native Americans and Alaska Natives.

The most recent data included in the report, from September 25, shows a case rate of 96.1 Covid-19 infections per 100,000 whites. Among Hispanics, that number was 90.8; among blacks it was 92.7.

The Native American and Native communities of Alaska recorded the highest case rate per 100,000 people, at 181. Asians had the lowest case rate: 42.9 per 100,000 people.

Data from the National Center for Health Statistics through June showed that racial and ethnic minority children made up 65% of those who lost a primary caregiver, while white children made up 35%. This is even if minorities make up only 39% of the American population.