When will booster shots be released for the immunocompromised?

Within the next 48 hours the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is expected to announce plans to authorise the first covid-19 vaccine booster shots for certain groups. The supplementary vaccines will initially only be available to immunocompromised Americans, but many health experts have admitted that booster shots will be an inevitability in the coming months.

An exact date for the announcement is still undecided but FDA officials have confirmed that the administration a decision is in the pipeline. An FDA spokesman told CNN: "The FDA is closely monitoring data as it becomes available from studies administering an additional dose of the authorized covid-19 vaccines to immunocompromised individuals.

"The agency, along with the CDC, is evaluating potential options on this issue, and will share information in the near future."

Fauci gives his approval for booster shots

It is thought that around 3% of Americans are immunocompromised, meaning that their immune system has been in some way weakened by disease, medical treatment or an organ transplant. Covid-19 poses an even greater threat to this group and a number of studies have looked into the possibility of providing a booster shot for them.

Speaking to NPR’s Morning Edition on Thursday, White House chief medical advisor Dr Anthony Fauci said that he expected that booster shots will be “imminent to make sure that we get [immunocompromised Americans] boosted so that they would be in a protected zone."

In studies the FDA found that those with a compromised immune system may have a less effective response after receiving the standard two doses of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines. A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) committee is scheduled to meet on Friday to discuss their findings on the prospect of booster shots.

World Health Organization calls for low-income countries to be prioritised

Despite the apparent inevitability of booster shots against covid-19, the World Health Organization (WHO) is calling for a moratorium on the supplementary shots until vaccine access has improved in poorer countries. Along with the United States, the likes of France, Germany, Great Britain and Israel have also started planning the introduction of booster programmes.

WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said: "I understand the concern of all governments to protect their people from the Delta variant. But we cannot accept countries that have already used most of the global supply of vaccines using even more of it.”

However Fauci insisted that the US was capable of providing its own immunocompromised citizens with booster shots, while also greatly accelerating the vaccine rollout in low-income nations.

He told NPR: "I feel very strongly, and I've been very vocal about that, that we have a responsibility as a rich nation — and other rich nations — to make sure that there's equity in the ability to distribute and the accessibility of vaccines," adding that “the United States is really doing both.”