This article is old. Click here for the latest information on the 2024-2025 Coronavirus Vaccine.
(First published date: October 2, 2023, Updated date: April 19, 2024)
Note: Information in this article is accurate at the time of original publication. Information about COVID-19 changes rapidly, so stay informed by visiting the websites of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the World Health Organization (WHO), and your state and local government. is recommended.
Since the newly updated (2023-2024 formulation) mRNA coronavirus vaccine became available last fall, it has been shown to be effective in preventing severe disease, hospitalization, and death from the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19). Improved. Vaccinations are available to protect everyone six months of age and older from serious illness, hospitalization, and death from disease.
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved the latest vaccines from Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna for infants and children ages 6 months to 11 years, and also for everyone 11 years and older. did. It also authorized the latest Novavax vaccine for people 12 years of age and older in fall 2023.
The vaccine targets XBB.1.5, the Omicron variant that dominated the United States and the world from November 2021 until last year. The CDC says the latest vaccines should also be effective against currently circulating variants of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, many of which are derived from or related to the XBB strain. There is. The vaccine is also expected to protect against JN.1, the strain currently dominant in the United States.
Although COVID-19 has mostly caused mild symptoms these days, Yale Medicine infectious disease expert Onyema Ogbuagu MBBCh said the disease can still lead to hospitalization and death. I'm reminding people. “Infections can have long-term effects,” Dr. Ogbuagu said, adding that even healthy people can develop long-term COVID-19 infections (new, persistent, or recurrent symptoms more than four weeks after initial symptoms). It added that people could develop (sometimes debilitating) symptomatic conditions. Coronavirus infection.
Below, experts at Yale University explain what you need to know about the latest coronavirus vaccines.
