Anti-Covid vaccinations, we start again. From Monday 12 September it will be possible to book the booster with the updated products, vaccines defined as bivalent because they contain two strains of the Sars-CoV-2 virus: the original one, the ‘Wuhan’, isolated at the beginning of 2020, and Omicron BA.1, ‘ progenitor of the Omicron family today dominant in the world with the sub-variants BA.4 and BA.5. These are adapted versions of Pfizer-BioNTech’s Comirnaty * mRna vaccines and Moderna’s Spikevax * vaccines, approved in early September by the European Medicines Agency Ema and the Italian Medicines Agency Aifa. Nearly 19 million doses are expected to arrive this month. But how to book? And who is the new immunization campaign aimed at? Here’s what to know.
HOW TO BOOK? From 12 September it will be possible to fix the appointment through the regional sites, for administration in vaccination centers or pharmacies.
WHO SHOULD BE VACCINATED? According to the circular issued so far on the subject by the Ministry of Health, the new vaccines “are recommended primarily to those who are still waiting to receive the second booster dose”, the so-called fourth dose, “according to the recommendations” and according to ” timing already foreseen for the same “, therefore over 60 and people with high frailty,” also including health workers, operators and guests of residential structures for the elderly and pregnant women “. They are also recommended “to all subjects 12 years of age or older still waiting to receive the first booster dose” or third dose, “regardless of the vaccine used to complete the primary course, with the timing already set for the itself “. In both cases, the interval from the previous dose (or natural infection) is at least 4 months.
WHO CAN BE VACCINATED? Beyond the public health recommendations, in regulatory terms the new vaccines are authorized for all over 12. Therefore, the AIFA Director General Nicola Magrini clarified, if it is true that “the updated boosters are for the categories at risk highlighted by the “ministerial” circular that have priority in vaccinations “, even among the under 60s” whoever wants to can do them “in fourth dose, according to the indicated times. They may, but “compatibly with the organizational methods of the Regions in relation to the priorities indicated in the circular”, specified the Director General for Prevention of the Ministry of Health, Gianni Rezza, announcing that “in the coming days more detailed indications will be given to the Regions on the methods” .
AND WHO HAS ALREADY MADE THE FOURTH DOSE? The health authorities on this point have yet to express themselves.