NIH Chief Supports Putting Teachers in High-Risk Category to Get COVID Booster Shots

Dr. Francis Collins, the director of the National Institute of Health (NIH), said that he would support putting teachers into a high-risk COVID-19 category so they can receive booster shots. Speaking on CBS News' Face the Nation Sunday, Collins said teachers could be considered a vulnerable population, particularly if they are working around children who are unvaccinated. "I think they could be seen in that space, they are after all in circumstances, especially if they're in classrooms under 12 that can't be vaccinated where they are at higher risk of exposure than most of the rest of us," Collins said. "So maybe in that regard they kind of fit into the same category as health care providers," he added. Collins' statements come just days after a U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) advisory committee declined a request from Pfizer to add a third booster shot to its two-dose regimen for those aged 16 and older. The FDA panel said it still needs more data for approval and instead is only recommending the third jabs to people age 65 and older and other vulnerable Americans. "It's unclear that everyone needs to be boosted, other than a subset of the population that clearly would be at high risk for serious disease," Dr. Michael G. Kurilla, a committee member and official at the National Institutes of Health, said on Friday. However, the FDA panel did not specify who among at-risk populations should be eligible to receive the third jab. Previously, those considered high-risk for COVID-19 have included people with health conditions such as diabetes, heart disease, and obesity etc. Dr. Peter Marks, who oversees the FDA's vaccine division, said at-risk individuals should also include health care workers, emergency responders and others whose jobs put them at special risk, such as teachers. "The way in which the FDA panel made the vote...it was a little ambiguous. FDA is going to think about that. But watch this space because CDC Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices will be meeting on Wednesday and Thursday. That's going to be a very important thing for them to wrestle with what exactly is included in that group of people with high exposure," Collins added on Sunday.

Depending on how the FDA chooses to define "high risk," tens of millions of Americans could become eligible for additional vaccine shots. The agency has the final say on vaccination approvals and will likely issue a decision in the coming days. The FDA panel's decision came just days before the Biden administration anticipated offering booster shots of both the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines. President Joe Biden sought to make the extra shots available to most fully vaccinated adults in the United States eight months after they received a second dose. Though the panel's decision was more limited, Collin said Sunday that he believes the list will be expanded in the coming weeks. "The place that might still be somewhat questionable would be the very youngest individuals is the benefit-risk needed there. But certainly, I think there will be a decision in the coming weeks to extend boosters beyond the list that they approved on Friday," Collins said.

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