(Trends Wide) — New data suggests that booster doses of covid-19 vaccines were well tolerated, Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), said Tuesday. English).
“The frequency and type of side effects were similar to those seen after the second doses of the vaccine and were mostly mild or moderate and of short duration,” Walensky said during a COVID-19 briefing at the White House. this Tuesday, when he described a new study published in the CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.
As of Sept. 19, 2.21 million people in the United States had received a booster dose of the covid-19 vaccine after its main series, according to the new report. Among them, 22,191 reported to the CDC’s v-safe system, a voluntary smartphone-based app that allows people to report how they feel after being vaccinated.
The new study includes reports from Aug. 12, when the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) authorized additional doses for certain immunosuppressed people, and Sept. 19.
Of the 22,191 that reported, some 7,000, almost 32%, reported having had some impact on health. More than 6,200 (about 28%) declared that they could not carry out their normal daily activities, especially the day after vaccination.
The main complaints of those who received booster doses
The most common complaints were injection site pain (71%), fatigue (56%), and headache (43.4%). Of those who reported general pain, only 7% described it as “severe.” Pain that made “daily activities” difficult or impossible was defined as severe.
Almost 2% said they sought medical attention and 13 people were hospitalized, but it was not clear from the v-safe reports why these people sought medical attention or were hospitalized. Members of the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System staff contacted those seeking medical attention and were encouraged to make a report, he said.
Of the 12,591 people who tracked how they felt after each dose of an mRNA vaccine, 79.4% reported a local reaction to the third injection and 74.1% reported a systemic reaction. This is similar to what people reported after a second dose, when 77.6% reported local reactions and 76.5% reported systemic reactions.
According to the report, no unexpected patterns of adverse reactions were identified.
“Covid-19 booster doses appear to be safe and people experienced similar mild to moderate reactions to the vaccine,” the report states.
Some people reported receiving a booster from a different company than their original vaccine or receiving a second dose of Johnson & Johnson vaccine from a single shot, but the authors of the report said the number of people in both cases was too small to draw conclusions.
