Vaccines for COVID-19 arm RSV: An update

ABSTRACT

[...]in this case, the Pfizer/BioNTech response-which is appropriate-is that if the level of antibodies is too low, we may need a third dose in the age group of 2 to 5 years. All that said, it seems the existing vaccines now have a 3-dose series in adults;we don't know necessarily yet for children if 2 or 3 doses will be necessary for all the mRNA vaccines, but there are reasonably good data that the immune responses induced may still provide a level of protection that is reasonable. Whenever there is a new variant, there are basic science laboratories in various parts of the world that are poised to immediately do studies with model systems in which they can put the variants into a virus that is not pathogenic and ask the question "Do the antibodies from some of the recipients of the vaccine provide some level of protection in a laboratory study?" With the Omicron surge being so big, we were able to get a pretty good idea of whether people who had received the vaccine were significantly less likely to have significant consequences from infection. William J. Muller is an attending physician of infectious diseases and scientific director of clinical and community trials at the Stanley Manne Children's Research Institute at Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children's Hospital of Chicago and an associate professor of pediatrics at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago, Illinois.