San Diego County expects to receive new COVID-19 boosters that target multiple strains of the virus next week, it was announced Friday.
The bivalent boosters were developed to generate an immune response from the original COVID-19 virus and BA.4 and BA.5 Omicron subvariants. The Pfizer/BioNTech is for those age 12 and over, while the Moderna bivalent booster is for those age 18 and older.
"These new boosters are a welcome resource to our ongoing COVID-19 prevention efforts," said Dr. Wilma Wooten, county public health officer. "The virus remains very prevalent in our community. With this bivalent vaccine, we have an updated booster that more directly addresses the most common circulating variant, and a chance to better protect our community. I encourage everyone eligible to get boosted."
Omicron booster shot Q&A
Does this booster target the BA.5 variant of COVID-19, and is that still the most dominant strain?
Dr. Eric Topol, director of the Scripps Research Translational institute, told KPBS Midday Edition "BA.5 accounts for about 90% of the cases in the U.S. And it's been a really tough road these last several weeks. Fortunately, we're in a descent right now, but there is no other variant besides this one called BA.4.6. that's troublesome. And that should also be protected by the BA.5 booster vaccine."
How long should you wait to get the reformulated booster if you've had a booster recently?
Topol said that patients should wait three to four months because "we don't know yet whether the booster directed to BA.5, which is half the BA.5 spike and half the original ancestral spike. So we don't know that's going to be better than the original booster."
The new omicron booster has not been given human trials. It's only been tested on mice. Is that problem?
"Yes, this is the first vaccine that's updated COVID, and it's the first time, of course, without human data," Topol told KPBS Midday Edition. "We are used to that with flu shots. Each year there's a flu shot that's updated based on mouse data, and that's been going on for quite a while. This is different because it's a different virus and it would be nice that we would have some data from people. We'll have that soon. But there is some uncertainty because we don't know with this BA.5 variant whether we're going to be able to induce very high levels of antibodies."
Read more of KPBS Midday's Q&A on the omicron booster here.
Healthcare providers can provide information about the availability of the new boosters, and availability at county vaccine events will be updated on coronavirus-sd.com and appointments can be made through the state's My Turn system.
More than 3.01 million — or 90.2% — of San Diegans age 6 months and older are at least partially vaccinated. More than 2.66 million — or 79.8% — are fully vaccinated. A total of 1,445,743 — or 59% — of 2,450,225 eligible San Diegans have received a booster.
The number of people in San Diego County hospitalized with COVID-19 has decreased by four to 265, according to the latest state data.
The number of those patients hospitalized who were in intensive care declined by five to 23 and the number of available hospital beds decreased by 51 to 232.
The county Health and Human Services Agency reported 753 new infections and five additional deaths linked to the virus in its most recent data, increasing the county's cumulative counts to 912,653 cases and 5,464 deaths since the pandemic began. A total of 3,978 cases were reported in the past week compared to 4,744 infections identified the previous week.
San Diego County's case rate per 100,000 residents 12 years of age and older is 25.46 for people fully vaccinated and boosted, 17.2 for fully vaccinated people and 50.51 for not fully vaccinated San Diegans.
The HHSA updates data on Monday and Thursday nights.
