The Covid Vaccine Situation for the Fall Is a Complete Mess
Dr. Katelyn Jetelina (aka Your Local Epidemiologist) has a frustrating update on how Covid vaccines are probably going to work this fall under the ideologically corrupt Trump regime.
The FDA is expected to license the Covid-19 vaccine. Word is that the label will be restricted to adults 65+ and people at high risk.
The Vaccine Integrity Project and professional organizations likely won’t align with RFK Jr.’s FDA license, which will cause confusion.
If you’re younger than 65 and don’t have a chronic condition, could you still get it after the label change?
Yes, but it will be complicated. While a provider could prescribe it off-label, in practice, it’s likely that most people won’t be able to access it that way.
Jetelina continues:
If you’re under 65 and not high risk, the window to get a Covid-19 vaccine is right now — before the FDA label changes. Once it happens, access will be limited immediately (if it isn’t already). CVS is no longer booking appointments. As far as we know, Walgreens and local pharmacies still are.
That was as of Monday — no idea if that’s still the case. And of course, because this is the United States, insurance will probably be a mess too:
Recommendations from these two organizations are really important for insurers. The hope is they see them and cover all vaccines, regardless of what RFK does. It also provides extra information to physicians who will prescribe off-label if RFK Jr’s FDA changes the label (as expected) this Friday.
We will not know if any of these recommendations affect insurance coverage until insurance companies confirm coverage.
[insert a lot of profanity here; seriously, this makes me so incandescently mad that if I wrote anything more it would contain every fucking swear word I know and then some]
Sources: Aug 18 thread on Bluesky, Aug 20 thread on Bluesky, Aug 18 newsletter.
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US pediatric group breaks with federal policy, recommends COVID vaccines for young children.
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