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Medicine

Immunocompromised May Need a Fourth COVID-19 Shot, CDC Says 207

According to updated CDC guidelines, people with compromised immune systems may get a fourth mRNA COVID-19 shot. CNN reports: The CDC authorized a third dose for certain immunocompromised people 18 and older in August. It said a third dose, rather than a booster -- the CDC makes a distinction between the two -- was necessary because the immunocompromised may not have had a complete immune response from the first two doses. A study from Johns Hopkins University this summer showed that vaccinated immunocompromised people were 485 times more likely to end up in the hospital or die from Covid-19 compared to most vaccinated people. In small studies, the CDC said, fully vaccinated immunocompromised people accounted for about 44% of the breakthrough cases that required hospitalization. People who are immunocompromised are also more likely to transmit the virus to people who had close contact with them. The US Food and Drug Administration has also authorized booster shots of all three available vaccines for certain people and that would include the immune compromised, the CDC says.

Research showed that a booster dose enhanced the antibody response to the vaccine in certain immunocompromised people. That would make for a fourth shot at least six months after completing the third mRNA vaccine dose. At this time, the CDC does not have a recommendation about the fourth shot. People should talk to their doctors to determine if it is necessary, the CDC says. People who are immunocompromised who got the single-dose Johnson & Johnson shot should get a booster at least two months after their initial vaccine. People who choose a Moderna vaccine as a booster, even if they received a different vaccine as the first dose, should get the half-dose sized shot that was authorized as a booster for Moderna's vaccine, the CDC said.
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Immunocompromised May Need a Fourth COVID-19 Shot, CDC Says

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  • Immunocompromised people are literally what they are labeled as: Immunocompromised!

    This means their immune systems do not work per normal. It means they are prone to contracting fatal infections of otherwise benign diseases that a normally functioning immune systems would fight off with ease. If they want to mainline drip covid boosters for the rest of their lives, that is their choice, but I'm done paying for it indirectly via my tax bill. They can (and should) start filing claims with their insurance for

    • by Cyberax ( 705495 ) on Thursday October 28, 2021 @01:45AM (#61934539)

      If they want to mainline drip covid boosters for the rest of their lives, that is their choice, but I'm done paying for it indirectly via my tax bill.

      Why the fuck the parent was modded as 'Insightful'?

      COVID vaccines cost $15 per shot and the price is likely to go down. The "tax bill" from immunocompromosed is negligible. Meanwhile, unvaccinated snowflakes are running up TENS OF BILLIONS of dollars in hospital bills. That will be eventually be paid by everyone else.

      • by Freischutz ( 4776131 ) on Thursday October 28, 2021 @06:15AM (#61934871)

        If they want to mainline drip covid boosters for the rest of their lives, that is their choice, but I'm done paying for it indirectly via my tax bill.

        Why the fuck the parent was modded as 'Insightful'? COVID vaccines cost $15 per shot and the price is likely to go down. The "tax bill" from immunocompromosed is negligible. Meanwhile, unvaccinated snowflakes are running up TENS OF BILLIONS of dollars in hospital bills. That will be eventually be paid by everyone else.

        Meanwhile the U.S. government pays $2100 per dose for Regeneron's monoclonal antibody treatment. The really funny part of this is that in order to avoid using vaccines so that they can 'own the libs' the Republicans are actually resorting to a $2100 laboratory-made treatment that mimics at great expense what the immune system does for free when you inject a human with a $15 vaccine shot. I have often wondered what would happen if the Dems got Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and Joe Biden to declare that breathing is very healthy for you and the most liberal possible activity to engage in.

    • that is their choice, but I'm done paying for it indirectly via my tax bill.
      You are not paying that with your tax bill.

      Or did you get an extra bill? For some guys who need a vaccine?

      That is not only an typical american attitude, it is annoying as hell that you can be such an antisocial asshole.

      You paid your taxes. And thats it. It is no longer of your business what the "state" or the "government" is doing with your taxes.

      If they feel fit that it is necessary to protect someone and do it with that measure o

      • You paid your taxes. And thats it. It is no longer of your business what the "state" or the "government" is doing with your taxes.

        Sorry. It *IS* the business of the taxpayer what the government is doing with that money. If taxpayers feel the officials are not good stewards of the money, it is incumbent on them to vote out those officials or in extreme cases force a recall.

        And for all those other authoritarians bleating about denying health care coverage for those who refuse the vaccination, those people *PAID* for their insurance too.

        • by Chas ( 5144 )

          Bingo.
          This blind trust that the government is unassailable and has our best interests at heart is nuts.
          The reality is that the country's been usurped by so-called public servants who're nothing more than career-minded bottom-feeders.

          • I know. What the Hell happened to the left? They went from "Question Authority" to "Papers Please" in a couple generations.
            • by Chas ( 5144 )

              No, they've pretty much ALWAYS been the "trust the government" types.
              Except when it suited them to be obstructionist, such as when they weren't in power.

  • Equity vs Egality (Score:3, Informative)

    by iwill86 ( 8309616 ) on Wednesday October 27, 2021 @10:00PM (#61934229)
    This is getting quite ridiculous and extremely selfish by a handful of wealthy nations. Less than 50% of the global population has received just a single dose deapite widespread demand. Only 3.1% of people in low-income countries have received at least one dose. As long as there remains a large population of unvaccinated people, the virus will continue to mutate and be a threat to all, regardless of how many boosters are provided. Wealthy nations must do all they can to offer vaccine doses to all nations and people who want and need tbeir first and second doses before offering widespread 3rd / 4th doses. That will do far more to eliminate the overall risk to everyone, those who refuse an initial dose (at this point, not gonna convince refuseniks, so stop trying) and those wanting hyper-protection.
    • by Arethan ( 223197 )

      So, do you believe that the wealthy nation governments are to blame because they are protecting their constituents, or because the drug companies have effectively refused to open source the solution so that they may continue to bilk the wealthy nations for those government paid doses?

      • by mark-t ( 151149 )

        Drug companies definitely carry a lot of the blame in this regard, IMO.

        For the time being, I believe that the patents should be suspended. They can be reinstated after the crisis is over.. Some would argue that this would discourage future innovation because it lowers the potential for immediate return on investment, but I maintain that this would really only dissuade future development if people generally expected that there was going to be a global medical emergency corresponding to every new develop

      • So, do you believe that the wealthy nation governments are to blame because they are protecting their constituents, or because the drug companies have effectively refused to open source the solution so that they may continue to bilk the wealthy nations for those government paid doses?

        No I think wealthy nations are stupid. They can vaccinate themselves and withhold vaccines to poorer countries all they want so they can vaccinate themselves ten times over. All that will achieve is one COVID variant wave after the other coming out of the vaccinated areas that is increasingly resistant to the vaccines and other treatments available. If the rich countries did what is in their own enlightened self interest as Ayn Rand would put it, they'd build giga-factories to make vaccines and kill this pa

    • Only 3.1% of people in low-income countries have received at least one dose

      It's not that simple, though. My understanding is that many of those countries don't have the infrastructure to store (in cold temperatures) and to deliver the vaccines to the entire population.
      It's not like you could just drop vaccines off at a doorstep.

  • by FuzzyDaddy2 ( 4821933 ) on Wednesday October 27, 2021 @11:59PM (#61934397)
    They should have made the booster based on the delta genetic sequence, not the original. That would probably provide better protection against both delta and future mutations from delta.
    • by smap77 ( 1022907 )

      Maybe, but given the months it would have taken to get those updates through the process, the benefits may very well have been moot.

      I'm laughing a little though. This is a long-haul, vaccinate-the-planet (potentially including susceptible non-human hosts) virus at this point. Boosters for Americans et al are probably statistically insignificant in the petri dish of mutation pool in the rest of the world.

    • by cmseagle ( 1195671 ) on Thursday October 28, 2021 @03:20AM (#61934637)

      Trials of a delta variant vaccine have been in progress for months. [ft.com]

      Maybe someday we'll get to a point where the safety and efficacy of mRNA vaccines can be taken for granted, and we can spin up new vaccines in a few weeks or months. We're unfortunately not quite there.

      • by larwe ( 858929 )
        "Patch Tuesday" for vaccines seems ... courageous. The direct analogy is that Windows 10's forced updates often cause exciting issues to people who are fed them sight unseen. The more serious answer is - there's a lot of possible interactions here. If we just automatically read out the current popular virus strains and code next month's vaccine for those strains, there's a risk that we'll be coding up a vaccine that generates antibodies against something benign (think: gut flora) or even essential. Clinical
    • by hey! ( 33014 ) on Thursday October 28, 2021 @08:00AM (#61935119) Homepage Journal

      And then they'd have to wait months while the clinical trials were conducted. Remember, Moderna had it's vaccine design done literally just days after the virus's genome was published. It took them 11 months of intensive work to get from that to an emergency use authorization. They'd have to go through all that again.

      And that would have been for uncertain benefit. These mRNA vaccines are to traditional vaccines what a sniper's bullet is to a land mine; they are molecularly engineered to aim the immune system at a very specific target. That target was chosen to be both easily accessible to the immune system and to be *highly likely to be conserved by evolution*. The guys who design these things know what they're doing.

      The problem with Delta isn't that the vaccine doesn't work, the problem is Delta is it's like a brute force response by the pandemic: overwhelm the population's growing immunity by sheer infectiousness. The existing vaccines work fine. It may be that a Delta-specific virus might be better, but it's only going to be *marginally* better. The existing vaccines *now* followed by updated vaccines *later* is a better response than waiting months for a better vaccine.

    • They should have made the booster based on the delta genetic sequence, not the original.

      Yeah, because we all know new vaccines are overnighters, get instantly approved, and that people inherently trust them. /s

    • They should have made the booster based on the delta genetic sequence, not the original. That would probably provide better protection against both delta and future mutations from delta.

      While in theory, this is better than the original Wuhan ancestral strain (with the few changes to stabilize the spike), it may not be needed at all.

      See this correspondence to NEJM: Differential Kinetics of Immune Responses Elicited by Covid-19 Vaccines [nejm.org].

      Antibody levels go down 6 and 8 months, as they should with any vaccine o

  • and a sixth and a seventh and... wait a minute.
  • I'm waiting for the definition of "fully vaccinated" to mean having X number of boosters. Perhaps a longform Vaccine Card will be required.

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