Federal health authorities said they expect a similar or slightly better respiratory virus season this fall – if Americans continue to get vaccinated.
They recommended that most Americans get annual shots for Covid-19 and influenza, and for immunocompromised and older Americans to get a respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) shot.
The forecast comes as the nation appears to have hit the peak of a summer Covid-19 wave and as Americans enter the fall and winter holiday season, when respiratory viruses tend to circulate through indoor gatherings of family and friends.
“CDC projects this respiratory season will have a similar or lower number of hospitalizations,” across Covid-19, flu and RSV, said Dr Mandy Cohen, director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), at a press briefing on Friday.
However, she warned, “there are a number of assumptions built into that, including that folks go and get vaccinated”.
In anticipation of the winter wave, the Food and Drug Administration this week approved a slate of updated Covid-19 vaccines to match what they believed will be circulating strains. The monovalent – or single strain – vaccine for Covid-19 is based on the Omicron KP.2 variant, which is available under the brand names Comirnaty or Spikevax.
“The good news is, so far, that the updated vaccines closely match the KP.3 family of viruses that continues to grow in dominance,” said Cohen.
She added that although the US was experiencing a wave of illness, hospitals have not seen an accompanying wave of hospitalizations and deaths. Cohen also said later that Americans’ “vaccination rates continue to be lower than I want to see”.
Cohen’s agency recommends most Americans get vaccinated in September or October, with the expectation of a winter wave of illness. Updated single-shot vaccines are available for all Americans aged 12 and older; children aged six months to 11 years are also eligible to be vaccinated with mRNA vaccines and should receive between one and three doses based on their previous vaccination history.
“Based on the available evidence, it’s expected the updated vaccines will provide good protection,” said Dr Peter Marks, director of the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research at the FDA. “We strongly encourage those who are eligible for an updated Covid-19 vaccine to receive an updated vaccine,” said Marks.
Marks also noted that the vaccines may provide as much as a 50% reduction in long Covid, the still poorly understood post-viral syndrome typified by fatigue, brain fog and heart palpitations.
“Just to put things in perspective, the mRNA Covid-19 vaccines have been administered to hundreds of millions of people in the US, and the benefits of these vaccines continue to outweigh the risks for individuals six months and over,” Marks said.
In terms of other heavy-hitting respiratory diseases, the FDA approved a trivalent, or three-strain, influenza vaccine in March. The vaccine will contain two influenza A strains (H1N1 and H3N2) and one influenza B strain. Cohen said her agency recommends getting an annual flu shot and the Covid-19 vaccine at the same time. The flu shot is recommended, “with rare exception”, to everyone aged six months and older.
For RSV, the CDC recommends some infants and Americans older than 75 be vaccinated. The vaccine is also recommended for people aged 60 and older, who have a weakened immune system, chronic lung and heart conditions or who live in a nursing home.
With the goal of reducing the spread of respiratory viruses this year, the Health and Human Services Department (HHS), of which the CDC and FDA are a part, are also pushing testing, treatment and education.
Dawn O’Connell, assistant secretary for preparedness and response at HHS, said the government would resume its program of sending out four free Covid-19 tests through Covidtests.gov.
A no-cost oral antiviral treatment shown to reduce the severity of Covid-19 called Paxlovid will be available to people who get health insurance through Medicare (for elderly and disabled people), Medicaid (for low-income and disabled people) or who are uninsured through the end of 2024.
HHS will also run a national ad campaign called “Risk Less. Do More” to encourage people at the highest risk of respiratory virus complications to get vaccinated. The campaign will have “tailored messages for people living in rural areas, Black and Latino populations and pregnant patients”, said Jeff Nesbit, assistant secretary for public affairs at HHS.
“There’s no denying the tremendous progress we’ve made against Covid over the last few years and that today we are better prepared and have more tools to protect ourselves,” said Cohen. “The best plan going into this winter is for everyone to remain vigilant and to use the tools we have.”
