Which COVID Booster Should I Get? How To Choose Your Vaccine 2023 – Women’s Health

A lot has changed with

But even if youve mentally checked out from COVID-19 news for a bit, youre probably aware that the Food and Drug Administration recently approved and authorized updated COVID-19 vaccines. These vaccines are better designed to target the existing COVID-19 strains that are circulating than past versions of the shot, with the goal of offering you better protection. Basically, its a good idea to get one of them to lower the odds youll get sick and become seriously ill if you happen to get COVID-19.

Of course, were talking about a few vaccines to choose from. With that, its only natural to wonder which COVID updated vaccine is best in 2023. Should you go with Pfizer? Moderna? Novavax? Theres a lot going on here.

An important point: Infectious disease doctors stress that the best COVID-19 vaccine is the one youll actually get. That being said, there are a few different things to consider when choosing the right shot for you. Keep this info in mind before you roll up your sleeve.

Meet the experts: Amesh A. Adalja, MD, is a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security. Thomas Russo, MD, is a professor and chief of infectious diseases at the University at Buffalo in New York. William Schaffner, MD, is an infectious disease specialist and professor at the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine.

There are three updated COVID vaccines on the market right now:

Worth noting: While plenty of people call these shots boosters, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and other medical organizations have made it a point to call them updated vaccines since theyre just tweaks to the original vaccine formulas.

The vaccines are different from past versions in the strains of the virus that they target, says Amesh A. Adalja, MD, a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security. All of the vaccines differ from prior versions in that they are targeted exclusively against the XBB.1.5 Omicron variant and are not targeted at the ancestral or any other strain, he says.

Otherwise, though, theyre similar to previous vaccines, Russo says.

Nope. You dont need to get the same vaccine, says William Schaffner, MD, an infectious disease specialist and professor at the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine. While some people prefer to go with the same vaccine they originally used, theres no rule that says you have to do this, he says.

Some people want to mix and match the mRNA vaccine with the Novavax vaccine because they think theyll get a broader immune response, he says. But thats still being studied. Meaning, if you got the Pfizer vaccine in the past, some believe you might get even more protection if you try Novavax this time around. Butwe repeatthat's still being studied.

Russo agrees. Grab whatever is available, he says. We dont have any clear indication that one is better than the other.

Doctors say its a good idea to get your updated COVID vaccine ASAP, given that we're now in respiratory virus season. The time to do this was yesterday, Dr. Schaffner says.

If you havent gotten your flu shot yet, its okay to get it at the same time as your COVID vaccine, Adalja says. Just keep in mind that theres a greater risk that youll have side effects if you do this, Russo says. People should use separate arms to minimize the injection site pain, Adalja says.

The CDC stresses that the updated vaccines are safe and effective, noting that hundreds of millions of people in the U.S. received COVID-19 vaccines under the most intense safety monitoring in U.S. history and that the FDA continues to monitor the safety of these vaccines.

Common potential side effects of the vaccine, according to the CDC, include:

The mRNA vaccines have been linked with an increased risk of myocarditis, inflammation of a particular muscle in the heart called the myocardium, but this side effect is rare, Russo says. In fact, the American Heart Association (AHA) says that you have a higher risk of getting myocarditis from COVID-19 than you do from the vaccine.

If youre interested in getting the updated COVID vaccine but have questions, talk to a doctor. They should be able to help give you personalized guidance.

Bottom line: The updated COVID-19 vaccines are now available. According to infectious disease experts, one isnt necessarily better than the otherall that matters is that you get vaccinated.

Korin Miller is a freelance writer specializing in general wellness, sexual health and relationships, and lifestyle trends, with work appearing in Mens Health, Womens Health, Self, Glamour, and more. She has a masters degree from American University, lives by the beach, and hopes to own a teacup pig and taco truck one day.

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Which COVID Booster Should I Get? How To Choose Your Vaccine 2023 - Women's Health