american health officials cautioned wednesday “the current protection against severe disease, hospitalization and death” for the vaccinated could diminish in the months ahead, particularly for the elderly and those vaccinated in the early days of the vaccine rollout. if green-lit by drug regulators, booster shots for all americans who desire one could begin in late september, starting at eight months after a person’s second dose.
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still, a july outbreak of covid in provincetown, massachusetts led the u.s. centers for disease control and prevention to walk back its mask stance for the fully vaccinated. of 469 people infected in the provincetown cluster following “multiple large public gatherings,” 74 per cent occurred in fully vaccinated people, meaning those who had completed a two-dose regimen of pfizer or moderna, the mrna vaccines, or a single jab of the johnson & johnson shot. among five people who were hospitalized, four were fully vaccinated; no deaths were reported. the viral loads of the vaccinated and unvaccinated also seemed similar, suggesting they were equally likely to infect others, prompting the cdc to urge the fully vaccinated to mask again indoors in areas with high covid infection rates.
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