The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently proposed an annual flu-shot-like approach to COVID-19 vaccines, allowing most adults and children to get a booster shot once a year to protect against the everchanging virus.
With the proposed annual vaccine approach, people would no longer need to keep track of how many shots they’ve received or when they got their last booster.
According to the FDA, this approach would also make promoting future vaccine initiatives easier, increasing nationwide vaccination rates. The proposal comes after reported low turnouts for recent booster vaccinations, with just 16% of those eligible receiving the latest booster.
The FDA is consulting with external vaccine experts to decide on future vaccine requirements for manufacturers. In addition, the FDA is evaluating whether all vaccines should target the same strains, which would make them interchangeable, or maintain the current system of primary sets and boosters.