#covid-19-vaccination

#covid-19-vaccination

The criteria has been tightened this year so that only those aged 75 and older are being offered free boosters, along with younger patients who have a weakened immune system.

Before this year, U.S. health officials following recommendations by infectious disease experts recommended annual COVID-19 boosters for all Americans ages 6 months and older. The idea was to update protection against the coronavirus as it continues to evolve. As the COVID-19 pandemic waned, experts increasingly discussed the possibility of focusing vaccination efforts on people 65 and older who are among those most at risk for death and hospitalization.

On Friday, vaccine advisers picked by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. declined to specifically recommend the shots but said people could make individual decisions on whether to get them. The recommendations from the advisers to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention require sign-off by the agency's director, but they are almost always adopted. Those recommendations normally trigger several layers of insurance coverage and allow drugstores in many states to deliver the shots.

Marin health officials have launched a campaign to remove obstacles to getting a COVID-19 shot, the county's top public health officer said. We're in a full court press to reduce barriers to access to vaccines, Dr. Lisa Santora said Monday. As of Sept. 10, Marin was at the highest level of COVID-19 wastewater surveillance numbers since the summer surge of 2024, said Santora, citing data from the Marin County Department of Health and Human Services.