Pfizer’s updated COVID-19 booster significantly revved up adults’ virus-fighting antibodies, the company said Friday, releasing early findings from a rigorous study of the new shots.
Booster doses tweaked to target the most common omicron strain rolled out in early September, and the Food and Drug Administration said the latest data should spur more Americans to get one — especially before another expected wave of cases as people travel for Thanksgiving.
Pfizer said people 55 and older who got the omicron-targeting booster had four-fold higher antibody levels than those given an extra dose of the original vaccine.
With many Americans reluctant to roll up their sleeves again, perhaps the better question is how the new booster compares to going without another dose.
A hint: A month after receiving the new booster, antibody levels in people 55 and older had jumped 13 times higher than before the extra dose. Younger adults saw a 9.5-fold jump, Pfizer and its partner BioNTech said. It had been about 11 months since the study participants’ last vaccination.
It’s too soon to know how much real-world protection the antibody boost translates into — and how long it will last. The results are preliminary, the study is still underway and infection-fighting antibodies naturally wane over time.
Still, the FDA had cleared the updated boosters without first requiring testing in people, basing the decision on studies of a similarly tweaked vaccine — against an earlier omicron strain — rather than the exact recipe.
So the new data “reassures us that this was a good decision to move to this bivalent vaccine,” FDA vaccine chief Dr. Peter Marks told The Associated Press. “Right now is the time for people to consider going out and get the updated” booster.
Health experts say it’s shaping up to be a rough winter. Flu season is starting unusually early and harsh, children’s hospitals are packed with another respiratory illness named RSV, and COVID-19 cases again are expected to rise with holiday gatherings.
The original COVID-19 vaccines still offer strong protection against severe illness and death, especially among younger and healthier people who’ve gotten at least one booster — a reason for anyone who hasn’t gotten their first set of shots to do so. But effectiveness drops as new mutants emerge and more time passes since someone’s last shot.
The updated doses are combination shots, tailored to offer a boost of protection against both the original coronavirus strain and the dominant BA.5 strain. Pfizer’s shot is available for anyone 5 or older. Moderna’s version of the updated booster is for those 6 and older.
About 26.3 million Americans have gotten an updated booster since they rolled out in early September, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Some small studies have recently raised questions about how much advantage the updated boosters will offer rather than just getting another dose of the original vaccine.
Pfizer’s early findings compared several dozen younger and older adults given the bivalent booster with a group who received a fourth dose of the company’s original vaccine.
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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
Chinese officials are trying to quell an outcry over the death of a 3-year-old boy from a quarantined residential compound that added to public anger at anti-virus controls that have confined millions of people to their homes.
The boy died at a hospital in Lanzhou of carbon monoxide poisoning blamed on a gas leak. His father accused health workers who were enforcing the closure of the compound of refusing to help and trying to stop him as he rushed his son to the hospital.
The father’s account on social media prompted angry comments about the human cost of the ruling Communist Party’s “Zero COVID” strategy that has confined families to cramped apartments for weeks at a time to fight outbreaks.
The quarantine system “is to protect life and health, not to confront those who need to be rescued with obstacles!” said a post on the popular Sina Weibo social media service.
The ruling party is sticking to “Zero COVID” at a time when other governments are easing anti-virus controls. That has kept China’s infection numbers relatively low but disrupts business and travel.
Residents of many parts of the Xinjiang region in the northwest were barred from leaving their homes in August and September. People in Urumqi and other cities who said they had run out of food and medicine posted appeals for help on social media.
Public frustration has boiled over into fights with police and health workers in some places.
The Lanzhou city government expressed “deep sorrow and regret” for the boy’s death in a statement and blamed “weak emergency response.” It said public employees who were found to have responded poorly would be “dealt with seriously.”
The boy’s father said he tried to call an ambulance after his son collapsed Monday after a possible gas leak at home. The father wrote that he asked health workers at the compound gate for help but they told him to ask someone else and asked him to show a negative virus test. The father wrote that he wound up taking his son by taxi to a hospital, where doctors failed to revive him.
A city government statement on its social media account said investigators found an employee at a neighborhood checkpoint told the father to call the emergency number when he asked for help.
Lanzhou Mayor Zhang Weiwen visited the neighborhood Thursday and promised to “open up the ‘last mile’ for the masses to seek medical treatment,” the government newspaper Lanzhou Daily reported.
The government promised to “deeply learn from the painful lessons of this accident,” the newspaper said.
The public, companies and foreign investors are watching for signs the ruling party might ease restrictions that are weighing on the economy and make travel into and out of China cumbersome.
The ruling party newspaper People’s Daily tried last month to dispel hopes for a quick easing, saying “Zero COVID” was working and citing health experts who said it had to stay in place.
Despite that, stock prices of Chinese companies jumped in Hong Kong on Tuesday after a rumor circulated on social media that a “reopening committee” might be created to look at easing restrictions. Prices fell after the government failed to confirm the rumor.
On Friday, share prices in Hong Kong jumped again after an official newspaper said the health ministry wants to make anti-virus measures less costly and a city with the world’s biggest iPhone factory promised to ease restrictions.
Health experts and economists say “Zero COVID” is likely to stay in place possibly through most of 2023, due partly to the need to vaccinate millions of elderly people before Beijing can consider relaxing requirements that people who come into China must be quarantined for a week or more.
This week, access to an industrial zone in the central city of Zhengzhou that is home to the biggest factory assembling Apple Inc.’s iPhones was suspended following infections.
The National Health Commission said this week the country needs to control outbreaks “with the minimum scale affected and the shortest time and lowest cost possible,” according to the Global Times, published by the ruling party newspaper People’s Daily.
That is meant to “correct mistakes from overly strict measures that have caused damage to people’s properties and lives,” the Global Times reported late Thursday.
Among other changes, train passengers bound for Beijing from the southern region of Guangxi, near Hong Kong, no longer need to submit nucleic test results, the newspaper said.
The ruling party responded to complaints about the high cost of “Zero COVID” by switching earlier this year to a strategy that isolates buildings or neighborhoods instead of entire cities after cases found.
Still, after outbreaks in Shanghai in March, most of the city’s 25 million people were confined to their homes for two months. More recently, families have been confined at home for weeks at a time following outbreaks.
On Monday, visitors to Shanghai Disneyland were temporarily blocked from leaving the park as part of virus testing the city said extended to some 439,000 people. The city health agency said the guests all tested negative.
In Zhengzhou, a city of 12.5 million people in Henan province, authorities said Thursday restrictions were being eased while the government tries to spot and isolate new cases.
On Wednesday, access to an industrial zone adjacent to the Zhengzhou airport was suspended for one week following outbreaks.
Thousands of employees who assemble Apple’s iPhone 14 at a factory there operated by Foxconn Technology Group left last month following complaints coworkers who fell ill didn’t receive medical help. The company later said it had imposed “closed loop management,” an official term for employees living at their workplaces and having no outside contact.
Foxconn said the Zhengzhou factory was operating but the company and Apple haven’t responded to questions about how production and shipments might be affected.
Authorities are focused on “restoring order to production and life” and will “strive to end this round of the epidemic as soon as possible,” said the Zhengzhou city government’s deputy secretary-general, Li Huifang, at a news conference, according to The Paper, a Shanghai news outlet.
Total Doses Distributed = 928,460,585. Total Doses Administered = 640,913,400. Number of People Receiving 1 or More Doses = 266,401,911. Number of People Fully Vaccinated = 227,377,753.
Access to an industrial zone in the central Chinese city of Zhengzhou was suspended Wednesday after the city reported 64 coronavirus cases and workers who assemble Apple Inc. iPhones left their factory in the zone following outbreaks.
The announcement did not say whether the isolation of the Zhengzhou Airport Economic Zone was related to cases at the Foxconn factory. It gave no indication of what prompted the closure. It said no one can enter or leave for one week except to deliver food and medical supplies.
Separately, the government reported 64 confirmed cases had been found in Zhengzhou over the past 24 hours. It said 294 asymptomatic cases also had been found in the city of 12.5 million. It did not say how many were in the industrial zone.
The ruling Communist Party is enforcing a “Zero COVID” policy that has closed areas throughout China for weeks to try to isolate every case.
That has kept China’s infection rate relatively low but has disrupted trade and business at a time when other countries are easing anti-virus curbs. Public frustration with the restrictions has boiled over into fights with police in some areas.
In Zhengzhou, everyone in the industrial zone will be tested every day for the coronavirus, the Airport District said. It did not say how many people might be affected.
Areas throughout China tightened restrictions on movement and canceled airline flights last month after new infections surged following the weeklong National Day holiday.
Residents of many parts of the Xinjiang region in the northwest were barred from leaving their homes in August and September. People in Urumqi and other cities who said they had run out of food and medicine posted appeals for help on social media.
Thousands of employees left the Foxconn Technology Group factory starting in mid-October after complaints people who contracted the virus received no treatment. Some accused the company of failing to enforce measures to prevent the spread of the virus.
Foxconn said Sunday it was using “closed loop management,” an official term for employees living at their workplace and avoiding contact with the outside. The company said ill employees were being treated but did not say if new infections still were occurring.
Also this week, visitors to Shanghai Disneyland were temporarily barred from leaving as part of virus testing the city government said Tuesday had extended to 439,000 people. The city health agency said visitors on Monday tested negative and were allowed to leave.
Last week, 1.3 million residents of Shanghai’s downtown Yangpu district were ordered to stay at home while they were tested.
President Joe Biden’s education secretary has tested positive for COVID-19.
Miguel Cardona, who has been vaccinated and boosted against the virus, tested positive Tuesday and has mild symptoms, the Education Department said in a statement.
He tested positive the morning after he attended Halloween festivities at the White House. Biden and his wife, Jill, hosted a trick-or-treat event at the White House on Monday, but the Education Department said they are not close contacts of Cardona, as defined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Cardona, 47, separately welcomed elementary school trick-or-treaters to the Education Department on Monday and later spoke at the Association of Art Museum Directors’ annual meeting.
The education chief will continue attending meetings and performing his duties while working remotely and in isolation, his agency said. He will return to in-person meetings when he tests negative.
Shanghai Disneyland was closed and visitors temporarily kept in the park for virus testing, the city government announced, while social media posts said some amusements kept operating for guests who were blocked from leaving.
The park closed Monday for testing of staff and visitors, Walt Disney Co. and the city government announced. No details of a possible outbreak were released.
“All guests have exited the park” following “expedited COVID testing,” Disney said Tuesday in a statement. It did not say when the park might reopen.
While other countries are easing anti-virus measures, China has stuck to a severe “Zero COVID” strategy that aims to isolate every case. Outbreaks in Shanghai in March led to a shutdown that confined most of its 25 million people to their homes for two months.
On Friday, 1.3 million residents of Shanghai’s downtown Yangpu district were ordered to stay at home while they underwent virus tests.
The city government appealed to anyone who had visited the Shanghai Disney Resort since Thursday to undergo three days of nucleic acid testing and avoid gathering in groups.
A statement by Disney on Monday said parts of the resort closed due to anti-virus regulations but gave no indication visitors were kept inside. It said Shanghai Disneyland, Disneytown and Wishing Star Park were closed while two hotels were operating normally.
Some rides and other amusements kept operating Monday while visitors were tested, according to social media posts.
A video on the popular Sina Weibo platform showed an employee in a mask saying to guests, “please return and take a tour in the park. The park’s gates are all closed temporarily, and you cannot leave now.”
Another video on Sina Weibo showed technicians in white protective suits who appeared to be taking throat swabs from guests after dark while police watched and a fireworks display lit up the sky behind them.
“The most beautiful nucleic acid detection point,” the account user wrote.
“Zero COVID” has kept China’s infection rates relatively low but at a high economic cost as businesses struggle with repeated shutdowns.
