The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has called for an updated COVID-19 vaccine.
The reason for the updated shot, according to the agency, is the lack of current vaccine effectiveness.
“Although real-world effectiveness studies suggest that currently approved/authorized COVID-19 vaccines continue to provide protection against more currently circling XBB sublineages, in prior years there appears to have been an inverse relationship between the time since vaccination and vaccine effectiveness, such that COVID-19 vaccine effectiveness against SARS-CoV-2 sublineages appears to wane over time and that better matching of the vaccine to circulating strains is associated with improved neutralizing antibody titers,” the FDA wrote.
“Consistent with this observation, a decrease in effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines (2023-2024 Formula) against COVID-19 caused by JN.1 lineage viruses has been reported,” the brief continued.
The FDA noted that data suggests updating the “current formula of COVID-19 vaccines to more closely match currently circulating JN.1 lineage viruses is warranted for the anticipated 2024–2025 respiratory virus season in the U.S.”
Research published in the journal Vaccines revealed that less than 20% of the eligible population in the U.S. received the latest booster shot for COVID-19 as of October 2023.
According to the research, “The most commonly reported reason for not having been boosted was a prior SARS-CoV-2 infection (39.5%), followed by concern about vaccine side effects (31.5%), believing that the booster would not provide additional protection over the vaccines already received (28.6%), and concern about booster safety (23.4%) or that it would not protect from SARS-CoV-2 infection (23.1%).”
Data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) found that as of May 18, 2024, only 22.4% of U.S. adults have the latest COVID-19 vaccine.
