Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and Chief Medical Advisor to the President Dr. Anthony Fauci said Sunday that it is “tough to tell” now if yearly COVID-19 boosters will be needed.
“If it becomes necessary to get yet another boost, then we’ll just have to deal with it when that occurs,” Dr. Fauci told ABC network.
He stressed “if you want to be optimally protected, absolutely get a booster.” On the Omicron variant, Dr. Fauci said “it looks like it has a high degree of transmissibility,” but that “the level of severity appears to be maybe a bit less than in the Delta.”
“The somewhat encouraging news is that preliminary data showed that when you get a booster – it raises the level of protection high enough that it does then do well against the Omicron which is again, another reason to encourage people who are not vaccinated to get vaccinated, but particularly those who are vaccinated to get boosted,” he remarked.
Over 52.9 million individuals in the US have received a booster shot, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) as the Omicron variant has been detected in at least 25 states across the US. – KUNA
