The chief medical officer says Moderna will be ready to roll out the Omicron-exclusive booster this fall:

Its medical director said that Moderna will be ready to launch an Omicron-specific COVID-19 booster vaccine this fall, as the number of Covid cases in the United States has increased by 51% in the past two weeks.

Dr. Paul Burton, a leading vaccine manufacturer, has announced that it is currently testing an injection against Omicron that will likely be “better” than the current injection and will be available in “large quantities” in September.

All Covid vaccines are currently based on the original Wuhan virus, although manufacturers have hesitated for months to create a new injection in case another variant emerges. If approved, Moderna’s shot will be the first to target the Omicron variant.

But more scientists have now expressed concern that additional backups are indeed necessary, saying they only cause a “temporary boost” in protection. Dr Soumya Swaminathan, chief scientist at the World Health Organization, said on Monday there was “no valid evidence” that a fourth shot would be helpful.

Second boosters are already available to all Americans over the age of 50, but adoption lags behind, with more than half still eligible for first refills. As the country enters its third winter of a pandemic, more Covid hits such as the flu are expected to begin this fall.

Covid cases in the United States continue to rise to an average of 56,000 per day, while a total of 43 states are now seeing increased infections. Vermont, Rhode Island, and New York all have the largest outbreaks.

New York today raised its alert level to “average” after the infection rate in all five of its boroughs exceeded 200 cases per 100,000 people. No new restrictions will be imposed at this stage, but if it gets “high,” public health leaders say they will consider re-regulating mask wearing in all indoor areas.

However, ICU admissions remained moderate last summer, and there are now about 2,000 patients on the wards. By comparison, they’ve never dropped below 4,000 last year. Hospital admissions with the virus rose 16% in two weeks, but that figure includes many people who test positive after being admitted to wards for another reason, such as a fall. The death toll from Covid continues to fall.

Moderna’s medical director, Dr. Paul Burton said today that the major vaccine manufacturer will be ready to launch Omicron-specific injections this fall. It came when Dr Soumya Swaminathan, chief scientist at the World Health Organization, warned that there was no valid evidence that a fourth dose was needed.

The number of Covid cases in America has increased by 50% in two weeks and is now increasing in most states. Hotspots are Vermont, Rhode Island, and New York.

But the number of deaths from Covid continues to fall, and most states are also seeing deaths begin to decline. But deaths are a lagging indicator because of the time it takes for a person to die from the virus.

The map above shows the infection rate in the states of the United States. Uncover the highlights of Vermont, Rhode Island, and New York

Dr. Burton told CBS News Take on the Nation that the vaccine manufacturer behind one of the three vaccines used in the US will have its vaccines exclusive to Omicron this fall. Pfizer said in January that it will have an Omicron-specific shot by March, although it has yet to be released.

Dr. Burton said: “We announced a new booster specific to the variant we tested a few weeks ago, and we have an additional candidate currently in testing, which I think is our lead candidate that I think will be even higher.

“We are confident that by the fall of this year we will have large quantities of this new booster vaccine that will protect against omycron and other variants and truly protect Americans and people around the world by the fall of 2022”.

Moderna has also requested approval of the vaccine in children aged six months to five years. If the green light is given, the United States will be the first country in the world to vaccinate children under the age of two.

Studies have shown that jab is approximately 37% effective against infections in children aged two to five years and 51% in children under two years of age.

Dr. For parents and guardians, this means that vaccinated children will “halve” the risk of infection, Burton said. “I know that 50 percent is usually less than what we’re used to seeing with our vaccine, but that’s because this study was done at this time. [the Omicron wave]†

But more scientists on Monday voiced concerns that the upgrade isn’t necessary.

WHO has yet to recommend another booster dose, but Dr. Swaminathan cautioned that “there is currently no valid evidence” to suggest that this would be helpful.

He told CNBC: “What we know from immunology is that if you apply another booster, you will see a temporary increase in neutralizing antibodies. However, we also found that these neutralizing antibodies decrease quite rapidly.

“This happened after the third dose. And it happened again after the fourth dose,” he said.

Among other scientists who suggested that no more injections were needed, Paul Goepfert, a professor of medicine at the University of Alabama, said it “really didn’t do much.”

“I’m not sure we should go out and jump in and shout that everybody should go abroad,” he added.

Last week, other scientists expressed concern that the United States was on the way to dispensing more doses, but it was unclear whether this was needed.

Dr. Paul Offit, of the Food and Drug Administration’s advisory board, said at a recent meeting that the only question was “not whether we can improve, but what we will improve.” “We haven’t defined what the purpose of this extra shot was,” he added.

Many countries, including the United Kingdom and Singapore, have approved a fourth dose for the most vulnerable, but unlike the United States, it has stopped distributing it to people over 50.

There are repeated suggestions that new Covid vaccines may be introduced each year, such as for the flu. But in the past few weeks, scientific consensus has broken down as more experts suggest that extra doses may not be necessary.

Hospitalizations and deaths remain low, as the number of Covid cases in America continues to rise with the emergence of a more contagious version of Omicron in New York.

Vermont with 350 cases per 100,000 people, Rhode Island with 305 and New York with 291 are the current hotspots with the highest number of Covid cases per capita in the USA.

In contrast, at the other end of the scale, South Carolina (16.28), Mississippi (24.7), and Wyoming (27.3) have the smallest outbreaks in the country.

The new Omicron sub-variant, scientifically termed BA.2.12.1 and believed to be approximately 25% more infectious than the old strain, is now dominant in all three hotspots and is spreading to other areas along the west coast. It has already reached every corner of the country.

The number of daily hospitalizations for the virus is now in 36 out of 50 states and is increasing by 16% nationwide in two weeks. But 17,000 rounds a day is only one-tenth of the peak of the Omicron wave, which hits more than 150,000 per day. Covid deaths are still falling in 30 states.