A recent rise in Covid-19 cases driven by the Omicron variant is prompting more vaccinated Americans to consider getting booster shots, but it doesn’t appear to be persuading large numbers of the unvaccinated, survey data shows.
10 Covid-19 Vaccine Myths No One Should Fall For Amanda Gardner
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Covid-19 vaccine myths
People all over the country are waiting in line, sleeves rolled up, to get one of the three Covid-19 vaccines, developed by Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson. Unfortunately, others aren t so eager.
The Kaiser Family Foundation reported in February that 22 percent of Americans still weren t ready for a jab. The gap between Americans who will and won t get the vaccine is shrinking, but it needs to shrink further, especially with troubling variants now circulating.
The only way to reach herd immunity is to get 80 to 85 percent or more of the population vaccinated.
Experts: Vaccines likely to be effective against new COVID-19 variants
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Experts say that currently approved COVID-19 vaccines, which are being distributed in the United States and around the world, are likely to remain effective as new strains of the coronavirus emerge. File Photo by John Angelillo/UPI | License Photo
Everyone has heard the scary reports about the new, more infectious coronavirus variants that are circulating in countries around the world, but scientists aren t pushing the panic button at this point.
Why? Because the new COVID-19 vaccines should still work on these viral interlopers.
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Luckily, the new variants still rely on the coronavirus spike protein to infect cells, and the two COVID vaccines now on the U.S. market specifically target the spike protein to prevent transmission, explained Dr. Kathryn Edwards, scientific director of the Vanderbilt University Vaccine Research Program in Nashville.