From WSJopinion: The more vulnerable people who are vaccinated and boosted, the sooner the pandemic will be over, writes DrMarcSiegel. Novavax, up for FDA authorization, will be a good booster option.
I’m usually cautious about prescribing new vaccines and treatments for my patients. For a year after the Food and Drug Administration’s 2017 approval of Shingrix, GlaxoSmithKline ’s vaccine for shingles, I was reluctant to administer it, choosing to wait for the thousands of people who took it in the clinical trial to turn into millions in the real world. But now that I’m confident it’s well-tolerated and effective, I offer it to any patient over 50.
With the Covid emergency I suspended my practice of waiting and began recommending the mRNA vaccines as soon as they were available. I’m very glad I did. But Covid fatigue, fear of novel technology, and a sense that the mRNA vaccines may not be up to the task against future variants have held many people back from taking the vaccine in the first place or getting a booster.