Category: Corona Virus

DENVER (KDVR) COVID-19 rates continue to steadily increasein Colorado over the last six weeks. The Centers for Disease Control and prevention has moved three counties into the high level for community transmission: Boulder County, Jackson County, and Broomfield County.

The CDC said communities with ahigh level of COVID-19transmission should do the follow:

As of Monday, the states seven-day positivity rate was 10.33%, which is up from 9.25% one week ago. Positivity rate measures the amount of COVID positive tests to the total amount of tests taken.

Overall, 44 counties saw an increase in COVID-19 positivity, 11 counties saw a decrease, two counties stayed the same, and seven counties administered fewer than 10 tests.

According to theColorado Department of Public Health and Environment, incidence rates are up over the last week.

Heres a look atpositivity rates for every county over the last seven days:

Significant spread of COVID-19 in Boulder County

According toJohns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, the percent positive is exactly what it sounds like: the percentage of all coronavirus tests performed that are actually positive, or: (positive tests)/(total tests) x 100%. The percent positive (sometimes called the percent positive rate or positivity rate) helps public health officials answer questions suchas:

The percent positive will be high if the number ofpositive testsis too high, or if the number oftotal testsis too low. A higher percent positive suggests higher transmission and that there are likely more people with coronavirus in the community who havent been tested yet, Johns Hopkins shared.

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COVID-19 rate over 10% in Colorado; here are counties with highest rates - FOX 31 Denver

Mike Stucka USA TODAY NETWORK| Register-Guard

Oregon reported 11,082 new cases of coronavirus in the week ending Sunday, from 10,891 the week before of the virus that causes COVID-19.

Lane County reported 1,020 cases and two deaths in the latest week. A week earlier, it had reported 1,037 cases and four deaths. Throughout the pandemic, Lane County has reported 61,910 cases and 547 deaths.

Oregon ranked 14th among the states where coronavirus was spreading the fastest on a per-person basis, a USA TODAY Network analysis of Johns Hopkins University data shows. In the latest week coronavirus cases in the United States decreased 11.3% from the week before, with 702,236 cases reported. With 1.27% of the country's population, Oregon had 1.58% of the country's cases in the last week. Across the country, 32 states had more cases in the latest week than they did in the week before.

Within Oregon, the worst weekly outbreaks on a per-person basis were in Multnomah County with 354 cases per 100,000 per week; Deschutes County with 338; and Washington County with 315. The Centers for Disease Control says high levels of community transmission begin at 100 cases per 100,000 per week.

Adding the newest cases overall were Multnomah County, with 2,880 cases; Washington County, with 1,898 cases; and Clackamas County, with 1,191. Weekly case counts rose in 22 counties from the previous week. The worst increases from the prior week's pace were in Marion, Jackson and Multnomah counties.

>> See how your community has fared with recent coronavirus cases

Oregon ranked 20th among states in the share of people receiving at least one shot, with 77.9% of its residents at least partially vaccinated. The national rate is 77.7%, a USA TODAY analysis of CDC data shows. The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, which are the most used in the United States, require two doses administered a few weeks apart.

In the week ending Wednesday, Oregon reported administering another 55,427 vaccine doses, including 4,397 first doses. In the previous week, 51,937 vaccine doses were administered, including 3,979 first doses. In all, Oregon reported it has administered 7,803,785 total doses.

Across Oregon, cases fell in nine counties, with the best declines in Deschutes County, with 668 cases from 779 a week earlier; in Washington County, with 1,898 cases from 1,995; and in Clackamas County, with 1,191 cases from 1,221.

In Oregon, 25 people were reported dead of COVID-19 in the week ending Sunday, one less than the week before.

A total of 760,803 people in Oregon have tested positive for the coronavirus since the pandemic began, and 7,611 people have died from the disease, Johns Hopkins University data shows. In the United States 83,984,644 people have tested positive and 1,004,733 people have died.

>> Track coronavirus cases across the United States

USA TODAY analyzed federal hospital data as of Sunday, May 29.

Likely COVID-19 patients admitted in the state:

Likely COVID-19 patients admitted in the nation:

Hospitals in 34 states reported more COVID-19 patients than a week earlier, while hospitals in 33 states had more COVID-19 patients in intensive-care beds. Hospitals in 35 states admitted more COVID-19 patients in the latest week than a week prior, the USA TODAY analysis of U.S. Health and Human Services data shows.

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Oregon COVID-19 update: Lane County has 1,020 cases this week - The Register-Guard

New Jersey on Tuesday reported 1,872 COVID-19 confirmed positive tests and one confirmed death as the United States has reached over 84 million cases.

The states seven-day average for confirmed cases was 3,341 on Tuesday, down 16% from a week ago, but still up 54% from a month ago.

The statewide rate of transmission for Saturday was 1.09. The transmission rate reported daily by the Department of Health were not available Sunday, Monday, or Tuesday. When the transmission rate is over 1, that means each new case is leading to at least one additional case and the outbreak is expanding.

There were 844 patients with confirmed or suspected coronavirus cases reported across 67 of the states 71 hospitals as of Monday night. Four hospitals did not report data. Hospitalizations still remain significantly lower than when they peaked at 6,089 on Jan. 10 during the omicron wave.

There were at least 80 people discharged in the 24-hour period ending Monday, according to state data. Of those hospitalized, 97 were in intensive care and 39 were on ventilators.

The positivity rate for tests conducted on Thursday, the most recent day with available data, was 11.40%.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention now lists 11 New Jersey counties with high transmission rates Atlantic, Burlington, Camden, Cape May, Gloucester, Mercer, Monmouth, Morris, Ocean, Salem and Sussex.

Those in high-risk areas are recommended to wear a mask indoors in public and on public transportation and stay up-to-date on vaccinations, according to the CDC.

Ten counties are in the medium risk category: Bergen, Cumberland, Essex, Hudson, Hunterdon, Middlesex, Passaic, Somerset, Union and Warren. Masks are not recommended in the medium and low regions.

New Jersey has reported 2,055,353 total confirmed COVID-19 cases out of more than 17.8 million PCR tests conducted in the more than two years since the state reported its first known case March 4, 2020.

The Garden State has also recorded about 339,242 positive antigen or rapid tests, which are considered probable cases. And there are numerous cases that have likely never been counted, including at-home positive tests that are not included in the states numbers.

The state of 9.2 million residents has reported 33,702 COVID-19 deaths 30,633 confirmed fatalities and 3,069 probable ones.

New Jersey has the seventh-most coronavirus deaths per capita in the U.S. behind Mississippi, Arizona, Oklahoma, Alabama, Tennessee and West Virginia as of the latest data reported May 17. Last summer, the state had the most deaths per capita in the country.

The latest numbers follow a major study that revealed even a mild case of COVID-19 can significantly affect the brain. Long COVID the term commonly used to describe symptoms stemming from the virus long after a person no longer tests positive has been found to affect between 10% and 30% of those who contract the infection, regardless of whether they have a mild or serious case. In New Jersey, that would mean that roughly 600,000 of the more than 2 million who have tested positive for COVID since the onset of the pandemic either have or have had long COVID.

More than 6.93 million of the 8.46 million eligible people who live, work or study in New Jersey have received the initial course of vaccinations and more than 7.8 million have received a first dose since vaccinations began here on Dec. 15, 2020.

More than 3.79 million people in the state eligible for boosters have received one. That number may rise after the FDA on Tuesday approved booster shots for healthy children between the ages of 5 and 11. U.S. regulators authorized the booster for kids hoping an extra vaccine dose will enhance their protection as infections once again creep upward.

For the week ending May 22, with 57.8% of schools reporting data, another 10,948 COVID-19 cases were reported among staff (3,066) and students (7,882) across New Jerseys schools.

Since the start of the academic year, there have been 135,409 students and 40,649 school staff members who have contracted COVID-19 in New Jersey, though the state has never had more than two-thirds of the school districts reporting data in any week.

The state provides total student and staff cases separately from those deemed to be in-school transmission, which is narrowly defined as three or more cases linked through contact tracing.

New Jersey has reported 876 total in-school outbreaks, including 6,234 cases among students and staff. That includes 69 new outbreaks in the latest weekly report ending May 23. The state reported 82 in-school outbreaks the previous week.

At least 9,117 of the states COVID-19 deaths have been among residents and staff members at nursing homes and other long-term care facilities, according to state data.

There were active outbreaks at 351 facilities, resulting in 3,883 current cases among residents and 3,589 cases among staff, as of the latest data.

As of Tuesday, there have been more than 529 million COVID-19 cases reported across the globe, according to Johns Hopkins University, and more than 6.28 million people died due to the virus.

The U.S. has reported the most cases (more than 84 million) and deaths (at least 1,004,783) of any nation.

There have been more than 11.38 billion vaccine doses administered globally.

Thank you for relying on us to provide the local news you can trust. Please consider supporting NJ.com with a voluntary subscription.

Deion Johnson may be reached at djohnson@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @DeionRJohhnson

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N.J. reports 1,872 COVID cases, 1 death. More than 84M positive tests in U.S. - NJ.com

NJ research lab tests for COVID variants

Dr. Barry Kreiswirth, research scientist for Hackensack Meridian Health system, explains on May 10, 2021 about lab work on COVID-19 variants in Nutley.

Danielle Parhizkaran, NorthJersey.com

Major researchinstitutions led by scientists at Hackensack Meridian Health's laboratory in Nutley are teaming up to develop new COVID-19treatments with federal grants up to $108 million as the virus continues to mutate into new forms, executives announced Tuesday.

The partnership among virologists and drugmakers aims to rapidly develop drugs that can be taken by mouth without a patient having to beadmitted to a hospital. Their goal is to be nimble enough to produce treatments that can respond to a rapidly changing virus, which can mutate into new variants that take only weeks to spread across the globe.

"The goal is to develop and bring to the market in real time the next generation of anti-viral agents that can control the current virus, future variants, future coronaviruses and future viruses of pandemic concern," saidDr. David Perlin, director of Hackensack Meridian'sCenter for Discovery and Innovation laboratories.

Dubbed the"Metropolitan AntiViral Drug Accelerator," the program is being launched at a time whenCOVID is still spreading rapidly in the U.S. and New Jersey, but physicians are seeing less severe illness, especially among the vaccinated.

Subscribers: What will COVID look like this summer in NJ? Here's what the latest models show

The initial grants from the National Institutes of Healthand the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease total a combined $65 million over three years, which could increase to $108 million if the program is re-upped for two additional years.

The teams, which include scientists from Rutgers, Columbia, Rockefeller University in New York, and pharmaceutical maker Merck & Co., will create and test "small-molecule antiviral drugs" to target all kinds ofcoronaviruses but emphasizing COVID-19. The research produced here could also help with future viral threats, scientists said Tuesday.

Current monoclonal antibody treatments have shown to be effective in keeping severe outcomes at bay. Physicians at Hackensack Meridian and Bergen New Bridge hospitals saythey have rarely had to admit COVID patients in recent months and simply send them home with the drugs.

The spring surge is being propelled by subvariants of omicron that have shown to be highly transmissible but less virulent so far.

Most New Jersey hospitals are reporting few serious cases of illness, with fewer than 50 patients on ventilators statewide over the Memorial Day weekend. The daily COVID death toll in New Jersey has been in the single digits for almost three months, after the initial omicron wave in December and January, whichsaw upwards of 80 to 100 deaths each day.

TheMetropolitan AntiViral Drug Acceleratorscientists will focus on a set of eight molecular features in the virus that play critical roles in replication, maturationand immune-system evasion.

The teams have already begun working onfive projects focusing on the viral targets andmatching drugs that would be effectiveagainst them.

The partnerships allow experts in different arenas to knock down roadblocks that ordinarily hamper drug development, said Dr. Charles Riceof Rockefeller University, who will co-lead the project.

Other institutions that will be working on the project includeMemorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center,the nonprofit Tri-Institutional Therapeutics Discovery Instituteand Aligos Therapeutics, a California company.

Much of the work will be done at Hackensack Meridian'sCenter for Discovery and Innovation, which houses 21 laboratories and more than 150 researchers at itsNutley campus.

This story will be updated.

Scott Fallon has covered the COVID-19 pandemic since its onset in March 2020. To get unlimited access to the latest news about the pandemic's impact on New Jersey, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.

Email:fallon@northjersey.com

Twitter:@newsfallon

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North Jersey to become hub of COVID drug development with $108M grant - NorthJersey.com

COVID-19 cases back on the rise in US after new subvariants appear

COVID-19 infections have spiked over the past month due to new and more infectious subvariants, waning vaccines, and fewer people wearing masks.

Damien Henderson, USA TODAY

On the cusp of last summer, as COVID vaccination rates were on the upswing and transmission rates were dropping, New Jersey officials talked excitedly about a return to normalcy, with offices filling with employees again andmasks no longer required in schools.

Then the delta variant emerged unexpectedlyin June and upended all those plans.

As summer 2022 approaches, New Jersey appears to be in a better place so long as a new, more virulent strain does not emerge.

Key metrics including severe illness and death have remainedrelatively low for more than two months, even though cases are on the upswing and every county is seeing high levels of transmission.

Public health experts and front-line physicians have expressed everything from caution to optimism over the past few weeksas New Jersey enters its third pandemic summer.

Is COVID still a virus that can mutate into the mass killer that has already taken 1 million American lives? Or is it evolving into one that jumps more benignly from host to host?

"The assumption that youre going to have milder illness is a hope but not necessarily something that will pan out,"said Dr. StanleyWeiss, an infectious disease specialist and epidemiologist at Rutgers Medical School. "The biology of this virus is changing over time. So we don't have ironcladanswers."

Dr. Gian Varbaro, chief medical officer of Bergen New Bridge Medical Center in Paramus, said it's unlikely that the virus will mutate into a more deadly strain.

Every pandemic ends the same way, with the virus mutating to become more infectious but it also becomes less virulent, less deadly, he said. Its not in an infectious agents interests to kill the people who its infecting, because then it cant spread. The best thing for a virus would be for you to never know you have it.

As New Jerseyans spent Memorial Day weekend opening community pools, hosting neighborhood barbeques and gathering in somber ceremonies to remember this country's war dead, it may seem like the pandemic is over. But it's not.

The latest forecasting models by thestate Department of Health show two scenarios through mid-August: a "moderate plus" model, in which cases and hospitalizations remain relatively stable, and a "high" model that shows two surges.

But long-range forecasts are difficult.

The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention project metrics out only two orthree weeks. And as COVIDcontinues to mutate into new variants with new characteristics, the virus has shifted its trajectory multiple times over thepandemic's 30 months,making it difficult to predict its next turn.

The emergence of new variants can change any well-informed prediction, said Gemma Downham, director of infection prevention for AtlantiCare, one of the largest medical providers in South Jersey.

The daily COVID death toll has been in the single digits for almost three months, and most hospitals are reporting few serious cases of illness, with fewer than 40patients on ventilators statewide as Memorial Day weekend ended. The vast majority of patients testing positive for COVID at hospital admission are being admitted for conditions unrelated tothe virus. As of Monday night, 844 people in the state'shospitals had tested positive for COVID.

Story continues below chart

The Health Department's worst-case scenario shows COVID cases surging in mid-June and again in mid-July, with the daily hospital census at almost 2,000. The high would hit on June 18with 7,050 cases, 1,602 hospitalizations, 154 intensive care admissions and 63 people on ventilators all about double what the numbers have been in mid-May.

The moderate forecast does not show a significant surge in the first half of the summer.

But that model appears to have already been exceeded. The model, which was completed on May 11, predicted a peak of 3,264 cases and 742 hospitalizations by May 17, compared with the actual tally of 3,842 cases and 862 hospitalizations that were reportedby health officials on May 17.

Downham, an epidemiologist, said she expects the surge to subside before the start of summer but is concerned that the virus is still transmitting at a high level, allowing it to mutate.

People who are vaccinated and boosted seem to have either no symptoms from the subvariants or symptoms so mild that they are mistaken for allergies or a cold. As a result, people let their guard down,and transmission goes up.

Many New Jerseyans have been reinfected during the latest wave, and long-term health implications of repeated COVID infections arestill unknown.

Even if you have mild to no symptoms, you are still contagious and can spread it to others who might be more vulnerable, Downham said.

"We are seeing individuals who were recently infected with omicron getting reinfected sooner than expected," she said."It appears as though immunity after an omicron infection is lasting less than 90 days."

At Bergen New Bridge, New Jersey's largest hospital,doctors are seeing more people come in with COVID, but their symptoms are not severe enough to warrant admission.

What were seeing is a lot of outpatient COVID and an increase from what it was several weeks ago, but nothing thats requiring hospitalization,Varbaro said.

Conventional wisdom holds that summer will result in less transmission in the Northeast, because people will spend less time indoors. While that held true in 2020, delta showed in 2021 that a new variant can upendthat notion.

By the end of last summer, Gov. Phil Murphy had reinstated mask-wearing in all schools, many back-to-the-office plans were postponed and New Jersey's COVID metrics ended up worse on Labor Day 2021 than they were the prior year.

Major variants detected so far this year are from the lineage of the original omicron strain that surged forcefully in December and January in New Jersey and then declined just as fast.

The region has seen the rapid emergence of the newBA.2.12.1 subvariant, which became the dominant strain in New Jersey and New York in early May.It has pushed out the BA.2subvariant and now makes up more than 70% ofstrains, according to CDC data.

On the horizon are the BA.4 and BA.5 subvariants, currently circulating inSouth Africa and Europe. If the patterns of transmission continue, it will be only a matter of time before they reach New Jersey.

Vaccines, booster shots and early treatment with monoclonal antibodieshave shown to be effective in preventing severe illness for now.

But health care professionals and policymakers have to remain nimble, because the virus could change dramatically in a short period of time, as seen with the delta and omicron variants, Weiss said. Using outdated data "is worse than useless, it's misleading," he said.

And scientists are constantly finding more information on how current strains behave. A study released this month suggests that COVID has the ability to linger in the body for much longer than suspected. "It shows how little we know about the virus," Weiss said.

Varbaro is optimistic that things will gradually get better even as the virus continues to spread and reinfect more people across the globe.

"We're going to see more blips and bump-ups like we're seeing now with these subvariants of omicron, butless virulent," he said."Is it possible if it makes some quantum leap in infectiousness?Sure. But it's unlikely."

Scott Fallon has covered the COVID-19 pandemic since its onset in March 2020. To get unlimited access to the latest news about the pandemic's impact on New Jersey, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.

Email:fallon@northjersey.com

Twitter:@newsfallon

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What will COVID look like this summer in NJ? Here's what the latest models show - NorthJersey.com

COVID is infamous for wreaking havoc in almost every body organ. COVID signs can be seen in the heart, lungs, skin, and also in the digestive system.

Apart from COVID another big challenge is dealing with long COVID, in which COVID symptoms are seen weeks and months after the infection. These symptoms linger in an individual for several months. Researchers are still studying the various causes behind the possibility of long COVID conditions.

Both COVID and long COVID conditions do not limit to the respiratory tract only. This proves COVID is not just a respiratory disease and its impact on other organs can range from mild to severe.

According to one review study done in September 2020, 53% of people hospitalized with COVID experienced at least one digestive symptom.

The best way to deal with COVID and long COVID is to spot the symptoms. Here are the common symptoms of COVID associated with the digestive system:

See more here:

Coronavirus: 5 symptoms of COVID related to the digestive system - Times of India

Total vaccine doses distributed: 746,456,955

Patients whove received the first dose: 258,463,968

Patients whove received the second dose: 221,190,484

% of population fully vaccinated (both doses, not including boosters) : 66.6%

% tied to Omicron variant: 99.9%

% tied to Other: 0.1%

Read more:

Coronavirus Omicron variant, vaccine, and case numbers in the United States: May 31, 2022 - Medical Economics

In almost two and a half years after the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, scientists have not yet managed to fully explain how features of the coronavirus turn some gatherings into superspreading events, while others do not lead to such a widespread transmission of the virus.

In a new study published in the journal Physics of Fluids, scientists from Canada and the United States have created a model connecting current biological knowledge about Covid-19 superspreading events with how such events have occurred in the real world to shed more light on this strange phenomenon. The analysis revealed that 80 percent of infections occurring at superspreading events arose from only four percent of those who carried the virus in those locations, called index cases.

By using real-world occupancy data from over 100,000 restaurants across 10 major US cities, the researchers examined several features ranging from viral loads to the occupancy and ventilation of social contact settings. They found that the main feature driving the high variability in superspreading events was the number of viral particles found in index cases, followed by the overall occupancy of the settings.

While there are uncertainties and unknowns, it appears it is rather hard to prevent a superspreading event if the person carrying high viral load happens to be in a crowded place, said study lead author Swetaprovo Chaudhuri, an expert in turbulent reacting flows and propulsion at the University of Toronto.

Professor Chaudhuri and his colleagues also discovered that the variability between infection events was significantly higher than expected a situation called overdispersion, which, in this case, indicates a strong heterogeneity in individual infectivity.

It is now well known that Covid-19 is airborne, and that is probably the dominant pathway of transmission. This paper connects indoor airborne transmission to the evolution of the infection distribution on a population scale and shows the physics of airborne transmission is consistent with the mathematics of overdispersion, explained Professor Chaudhuri.

To mitigate such superspreading events, vaccination, ventilation, filtration, mask wearing, reduced occupancy all are required. However, putting them in place is not enough; knowing what size, type, and parameters can mitigate risk to certain acceptable levels is important, he concluded.

By Andrei Ionescu, Earth.com Staff Writer

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What do we know about Covid-19 superspreading events? - Earth.com

Check out what's clicking on FoxBusiness.com.

Manufacturing in China started to improve in May after the country lifted coronavirus lockdowns that shut down China's richest and most populous city of Shanghai, as well as other industrial areas, according to an official survey released Tuesday.

The Purchasing Managers' Index of the National Bureau of Statistics of China's manufacturing industry jumped from 47.4% in April to 49.6% this month on a 100-point scale. Numbers below 50 reveal activity contracting.

FILE - A worker operates a machine for knitting socks in a factory in Funan county in central China's Anhui province, on March 1, 2022. Chinese manufacturing activity started to rebound in May after the government eased anti-virus restrictions that s (AP Newsroom)

New orders, exports and employment all improved during the month of May.

More businesses in Shanghai are allowed to reopen this week after COVID-19 outbreaks were considered by the government as under control.

MANUFACTURERS WEIGH IN AS CONGRESS NEGOTIATES CHINA COMPETITION BILL

China immigration inspection officers in protective overalls march near a container ship at a port in Qingdao in eastern China's Shandong province Sunday, Nov. 7, 2021. China's exports remained strong in October, a positive sign for an economy trying (Chinatopix via AP / AP Images)

JOBS REPORT GAMESTOP EARNINGS, HOME PRICES TOP WEEK AHEAD

Other industrial centers like Shenzhen and Changchun were also forced to shut down this spring due to the coronavirus, which disrupted the cities' manufacturing and trade.

Tuesday's data shows that "activity has started to rebound as containment measures were rolled back," Capital Economics' Sheana Yue said in a report, adding that the recovery "is likely to remain tepid amid weak external demand and labor market strains."

NBA OWNERS UNDER THE MICROSCOPE OVER BILLIONS TIED TO CHINA: REPORT

Chinese President Xi Jinping is zeroing in on the ties that Chinas state banks and other financial stalwarts have developed with big private-sector players, expanding his push to curb capitalist forces in the economy. ((AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein) / AP Newsroom)

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The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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China manufacturing begins to rebound as COVID-19 restrictions ease - Fox Business

If you arefully vaccinated, you may be excited about gathering with family and friends again. You might even be planning a winter vacation. But there are still nagging questions about how long protection from thecoronavirus vaccineswill last. For instance, will your shot wear off gradually or suddenly? Will you need abooster? "We can only say that a vaccine is protective as long as we are measuring it," says Yale Medicine infectious diseases specialistJaimie Meyer, MD, MS.Read on to find out moreand to ensure your health and the health of others, don't miss these Sure Signs You've Already Had COVID.

Vaccine longevity became a hot topic in August, when some studies began to suggest vaccine effectiveness was waning, although data also showed the vaccines were still highly effective against hospitalization. Inone studyreported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), data from the state of New York showed vaccine effectiveness dropping from 91.8 to 75% against infection.

Data about the vaccines waning contributed to a decision in the fall of 2021 to make booster shots availablethe CDC says all adults 18 or older should get a booster six months after completing their primary vaccination series if they started with Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna, or two months after getting the J&J single-shot vaccine Teenagers ages 16 or 17 may also get the Pfizer-BioNTech booster, which the FDA authorized for that age group in December 2021. A mix-and-match policy allows people to take any of the three COVID-19 vaccines available in the U.S. as a booster shot, regardless of which vaccine a person had for their primary vaccination.

Pfizer and Moderna have been monitoring immunity in people who were given their vaccines in the initial clinical trialsboth companies had reported strong overall efficacy at the six-month mark. (Pfizer reported on its efficacy in apreprintthat has not been reviewed by outside scientists; Moderna released acompany statement.)

One thing researchers are monitoring in vaccine recipients is levels of antibodies, which are proteins produced by the body's immune system when it detects harmful substances, and that are easily measured from blood samples. "Antibodies are a really good marker for protection against infection, so we will be monitoring those levels for as long as we can measure them," saysAkiko Iwasaki, PhD, a professor of immunobiology at Yale School of Medicine.

A report inThe New England Journal of Medicine(NEJM) in April showed that 33 participants who had received the Moderna vaccine during the Phase I trial had a gradual decline in antibody protectionand, based on the slope, Iwasaki says, that is hopeful news. "If antibodies are going down very quickly, you would expect that to last for a short time." The slow decline raises hopes that the mRNA vaccines will be protective for at least a year, if not longer, she says. (It should be noted that the trial occurred prior to when Delta became the predominant virus variant in the U.S. last summer; as of mid-December 2021,Omicronis the predominant virus in the U.S.)

Another measure is T cells, which scientists are still studying for their ability to kill virus-infected cells in the context of COVID-19, and which may also provide important protection. T cells are more difficult to measure, Iwasaki says. But they may be importantlast year,a study inNatureshowed that people who were infected with severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), a different coronavirus outbreak that killed almost 800 people in 2003, maintained T-cell immunity 17 years after they recovered.

Still another way to predict how long protection might last is by looking at natural immunity, says Dr. Meyer. This means studying immunity people developed after infection with COVID-19. "We know for at least the first few months after symptomatic diseaseand even longerthat people are unlikely to become reinfected," she says.

But it's important to know that immunity induced by the mRNA vaccines is stronger and more reliable than natural immunity, says Iwasaki. That's because levels of natural immunity tend to differ from person to person. "Vaccines normalize the response to a very high level, where it uniformly uplifts everybody," she says. "If you are starting with the high level, even if you start to decline from that level, it will take much longer before you need a booster."

This is a reason why the CDC recommends vaccinations for people who have had a COVID-19 infection as well as for those who have not.

No one knows for sure whether one vaccine will last longer than another. Instead, one question to ask might be whether Pfizer and Moderna's mRNA vaccines, which had an especially robust response, also have potential to be the longest lasting, Dr. Meyer says.

The two mRNA vaccines use a relatively new technology that delivers a tiny piece of genetic code from the SARS CoV-2 virus into the body to provide instructions for making copies of spike proteins that will stimulate an immune response. The Johnson & Johnson vaccine takes a more traditional approach that involves an inactive adenovirus (a common virus that can cause colds and other illnesses when it's active).

"The mRNA vaccines are a novel tool that hasn't been widely rolled out with any other virus, and so far in clinical trials they have had a much more robust immune response," Dr. Meyer says. Whatever the answer to the question of which will last the longest, the Pfizer and Moderna mRNA vaccines work similarly, so it seems likely that they will have a similar impact on immunity, she says.

However, while both vaccines still are considered highly effective, some recent studies showed Moderna to be more protective. A study published inTheNew England Journal of Medicinefound the Moderna vaccine to be 96.3% effective in preventing symptomatic illness in health care workers compared to 88.8% for Pfizer. Another study, from the CDC, found Moderna's effectiveness against hospitalization held steady over a four-month period, while Pfizer's fell from 91% to 77%. But scientists say more data is needed to fully understand the differences between the two vaccines.

"It's also possible that the length of immunity is somewhat dependent on the patient," Dr. Meyer adds. While more research is needed, there could be variations in immune responses from person to person based on such factors as age, medical conditions, and medications they may be taking. Overall, though, the mRNA vaccines appear to be so effective that they level the playing field in terms of achieving protection from infection, says Dr. Meyer.

It's critical that as many people as possible get their primary vaccination shots, Dr. Meyer says. In December 2021, the CDC endorsed a recommendation to choose the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccines, in response to concerns over rare blood clots associated with Johnson & Johnson's shot.6254a4d1642c605c54bf1cab17d50f1e

"The good news is that Pfizer and Moderna made their mRNA vaccines easy to update," Dr. Meyer says. "It just has to be tweaked a little bit, like having a computer code that needs a couple of minor edits. It's relatively easy to build."It's also important to follow the CDC's recommendations onbooster shots.

"The hope is that the case rate will go down and more people will be less likely to be exposed." That advice is especially important with the Delta and Omicron variants, which have proven to be more contagious than previous variants, prompting the CDC to issuestricter guidelinescalling for everyonevaccinated or nottowear masksindoors in areas of high transmission.

Even if Delta and Omicron go away, "I think those preventive measures will become even more important as the year passes, because potentially your immunity is going to wane over time," Dr. Meyer says.

Meanwhile, people need consider the amount of virus activity in their area, and what they need to do to protect the immunocompromised, and children and others who can't get the vaccine. "I tell my family, 'It's great that you're vaccinated. That's wonderful, and you will have a lot more freedom and flexibility. But even the vaccines don't have 100% guarantees, so whatever you do, you want to keep weighing the risks.'" she says. And to protect your life and the lives of others, don't visit any of these 35 Places You're Most Likely to Catch COVID.

This article has been published in Yale Medcine.

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