As many states across the country begin to open up due to more people become fully vaccinated, many are wondering just how long the COVID vaccine will last. There have been talks about the vaccine being given yearly much like the flu shot, and recently, Pfizer’s CEO, Albert Bourla, said that getting another booster shot will most likely be the reality.
“A likely scenario is that there will be likely a need for a third dose, somewhere between six and 12 months and then from there, there will be an annual revaccination, but all of that needs to be confirmed. And again, the variants will play a key role,” Bourla told CNBC’s Bertha Coombs during an event with CVS Health.
According to Pfizer CEO, Albert Bourla, the main reason for the booster shot is due to the many variants that are popping up around the world. “The variants will play a key role. It is extremely important to suppress the pool of people that can be susceptible to the virus.”
“There are vaccines like polio where one dose is enough,” Mr. Bourla said. “And there are vaccines like flu that you need every year. The Covid virus looks more like the influenza virus than the polio virus.” Research is still being done about how long the initial COVID vaccines will last.
Biden administration’s Covid response chief science officer, David Kessler, said Americans should expect to receive booster shots to protect against coronavirus variants.
“We are studying the durability of the antibody response,” he said. “It seems strong but there is some waning of that and no doubt the variants challenge … they make these vaccines work harder. So I think for planning purposes, planning purposes only, I think we should expect that we may have to boost.”
Pfizer and BioTech have been testing a third dose of the COVID-19 vaccine since February in order to better understand the immune system response against the new variants.
