A study from the Centers For Disease Control shows booster shots’ effectiveness in preventing emergency room visits dropped from 97 percent in the first two months to 89 percent at four months.
Protection against delta variant- related hospitalizations dropped from 96 percent at two months to 76 percent at four.
Dr. Brian Dixon is the director for public health informatics at the Regenstrief Institute and helped conduct the study. He said people who got the third dose of the COVID vaccine are still much better off.
“During the omicron period, those who had three doses of the vaccine had 40 percent higher protection than those who only had two doses.”
Dixon said this means people will probably have to get booster shots again in the future.
“Because you’re still at four months out, you’re still at a pretty high level of protection. So it maybe longer than (six months). But that will be up to policymakers to make that determination.”
He added rates of protection against newer strains such as omicron have been high. He says moving forward, as new vaccines are manufactured, they’ll incorporate the current major strains – which is what is done for flu shots too.
