How eager people are to receive the rejiggered booster, however, remains to be seen — especially when it comes to the youngest now eligible for the shots. Federal regulators have approved the new Pfizer booster for adolescents as young as 12; recipients of the Moderna booster must be 18 or older.
Dr. Lloyd Fisher, a Worcester pediatrician and former president of the Massachusetts chapter of the American Academy of Pediatricians, said he hasn’t yet gotten many calls from people seeking the new booster for their children.
“Some are asking but the phones aren’t overwhelmed,” said Fisher.
He and other doctors said interest may pick up after Labor Day weekend passes, with families back to school and more people returning to work. Another possible catalyst: the cooler weather also makes transmission indoors more likely.
For people who received a booster shot recently, the FDA says they could get the new Omicron shot as soon as two months after, although some scientists say that waiting longer between shots may help bolster the immune response.
For Fisher, the priority continues to be ensuring that children have received the primary series of vaccines, which are very effective at preventing severe illness if they become infected with an Omicron subvariant.
“That is definitely the biggest focus at this point,” Fisher said. “We know the primary series is safe and effective at reducing severe illness, so we want to increase the uptake on the primary series.”
He has succeeded in persuading parents to let their teenagers receive two shots of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines and, in some cases, the original boosters as well, he said. But it’s been much harder persuading parents of kids under 12.
While Massachusetts claims one of the highest percentage of residents vaccinated against COVID, the number of those still eschewing the shots is considerable. CDC data show roughly 67 percent of Americans are fully vaccinated with their primary COVID shots, but in Massachusetts that figure is 78 percent.
The percentages decline significantly when it comes to boosters. Nationally, just 49 percent have received at least one booster shot; in Massachusetts it’s 59 percent. And it drops sharply among the youngest ranks. Just 38 percent of adolescents, aged 12-15 have received a booster in Massachusetts, state data show.
Dr. Shannon Scott-Vernaglia, a pediatrician at Mass General Hospital for Children, said the vast majority of patients in her practice got the primary series of shots, but there was less interest in getting the boosters.
Recently, she said, many parents appeared to be holding off arranging booster shots for adolescents because they wanted regulators to authorize the updated shots for the Omicron strains.
“In the last few weeks, we’ve been playing a bit of a waiting game,” she said. “Families are trying desperately to figure out what the perfect timing is, and it’s hard to know.”
She plans to enthusiastically recommend the new boosters, which she expects will arrive at her office sometime this week. Although patients who receive the primary series of vaccines are well protected from serious illness caused by the Omicron strains, she said, even a mild infection can force teenagers to isolate themselves for several days and have a significant impact on their education and families.
Dr. Armando Paez chief of the division of infectious diseases at Baystate Health in Springfield, cares for patients with HIV and other chronic health issues, and he said many have been glued to the Internet following every development and eagerly anticipating the new booster shots.
“These patients, who are at high risk [of serious complications from COVID], those are the ones who will be rushing in,” he said.
At Atrius Health, the state’s largest independent physician group with more than 30 locations in Eastern Massachusetts, many patients have recently been calling to ask about the shots, said Dr. Jane Fogg, executive chair of…
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