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It was a wild FDA vaccine meeting Friday. The advisory committee rejected a proposal to distribute booster shots of Pfizer's and BioNTech's Covid-19 vaccine to the general public, paring back those plans to unanimously recommend the third shots to people age 65 and older and other vulnerable Americans. We have the latest below.
| | FDA panel makes a controversial decision on booster shots | The FDA's Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee voted 16-2 against distributing third shots to Americans 16 and older, before unanimously embracing an alternate plan to give boosters to older Americans and those at a high risk of suffering from severe illness if they get the virus. The nonbinding decision comes as the Biden administration has said it wants to begin offering booster shots to the general public as early as next week. The committee vote was expected to be a controversial one. Dr. Peter Marks, the agency's top vaccine regulator, reminded the group that the FDA doesn't have to follow its recommendation. "We are not bound at FDA by your vote, just so you understand that."
-Berkeley Lovelace Jr. | | | | Side effects from Covid vaccine boosters are similar to second dose, Pfizer tells FDA | Side effects from Covid vaccine booster shots are similar to those felt after the second dose and are more likely to affect younger people, Pfizer said in a 52-page report released by the FDA on Wednesday. Pfizer's phase three study of vaccine booster doses, which included a group of about 300 participants from ages 18 to 55, found that 63.7% experienced fatigue after getting their boosters, 48.4% had headaches and 39.1% felt muscle pain. The majority of reactions to the booster were mild or moderate in severity, the company said as it seeks approval to distribute booster shots across the U.S.
-Robert Towey | | | | Short-staffed hospitals weigh pushback on vaccine mandates | The Biden administration's proposed national vaccine mandate for health-care workers could take the pressure off hospitals like Lewis County General in upstate New York, which shut down its maternity ward this week after six nurses quit rather than get the jab. Larger hospitals aren't seeing major resignations and aren't not sweating those who leave in this tight job market. Unvaccinated workers getting sick also adds to shortages of their over-burdened staff.
-Bertha Coombs | | | | UK, Trinidad officials refute Nicki Minaj's 'false claim' Covid shots cause swollen testicles | Health officials from the U.K. to Trinidad refuted rapper Nicki Minaj's "false claim" that her cousin's friend's testicles swelled after he received a Covid-19 vaccine in her home country of Trinidad. Dr. Deyalsingh, health minister of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, said Minaj's tweet late Monday to her more than 22 million followers sent the ministry on a wild goose chase trying to track down the poor man she said became impotent and lost his fiance over the side effects. Deyalsingh said that there hasn't been a single reported case of testicular swelling following Covid vaccine shots in Trinidad and that health officials weren't aware of any cases "anywhere else in the world."
-Rich Mendez | | | | Italy makes Covid passports mandatory for all employees | Italy has become the first European country to make a Covid certificate mandatory for all workers, as countries start to take stronger measures in an effort to boost inoculation rates. The document, which can be digital or paper, outlines whether a person has been vaccinated, recovered recently from the virus, or tested negative for Covid. It was originally created at the EU level to support intra-European travel, but Italy was among the first countries to also use it as a requirement to enter venues such as museums and gyms.
-Silvia Amaro | |
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