On Tuesday, the Food and Drug Administration authorized emergency use of a second booster shot of the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna coronavirus vaccines for people over the age of 50. To qualify, patients must have received their first booster shot at least four months prior.
The news came at a vital moment, the same week that the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) released data showing that BA.2, the more contagious variant of omicron, had surpassed its parent strain to become the dominant coronavirus strain circulating in the United States. Notably, the omicron variant of COVID-19 was already the most contagious virus to have ever existed in a human population in recorded history.
