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A pharmacist prepares the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 mRNA vaccine at a pharmacy prototype clinic in Halifax, Canada, on March 9, 2021. (Andrew Vaughan\/The Canadian Press)<\/p><\/div><\/p>\n
BY JACK PHILLIPS
\nThe Epoch Times<\/p>\n
People who have received the Pfizer<\/a>\u00a0COVID-19 vaccine are \u201clikely\u201d to need a third dose sometime within a year after being fully vaccinated.<\/p>\n \u201cA likely scenario is that there will be likely a need for a third dose, somewhere between six and 12 months and then from there, there will be an annual revaccination,\u201d\u00a0CEO<\/a>\u00a0Albert Bourla said during an online event on April 15.<\/p>\n \u201cBut all of that needs to be confirmed. And again, the variants will play a key role,\u201d he said. \u201cWe need to see what would be the sequence, and for how often we need to do that, that remains to be seen.\u201d<\/p>\n Bourla also said it \u201cis extremely important to suppress the pool of people that can be susceptible to the virus.\u201d<\/p>\n Both the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines require two shots, while the Johnson & Johnson vaccine requires one. U.S. health agencies this week recommended a pause in administering the J&J vaccine after several reports of blood clots out of millions of vaccinations.<\/p>\n J&J CEO Alex Gorsky several weeks ago suggested that people will have to get COVID-19 shots annually, similar to seasonal flu shots. COVID-19 is the disease caused by the\u00a0CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus<\/a>.<\/p>\n Pfizer and BioNTech, meanwhile,\u00a0said earlier this month<\/a>\u00a0that their vaccine is 91 percent effective through at least six months.<\/p>\n \u201cThese data also provide the first clinical results that a vaccine can effectively protect against currently circulating variants, a critical factor to reach herd immunity and end this pandemic for the global population,\u201d BioNTech co-founder and CEO Ugur Sahin said in a statement at the time.<\/p>\n Moderna CEO Stephane Bancel\u00a0said in an interview on April 14<\/a>\u00a0that the firm is aiming to have a booster shot, or a third dose, available in the fall.<\/p>\n The United States is tracking infections in people who have been fully vaccinated, Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the U.S. Centers of Disease Control and Prevention, told a House subcommittee hearing on April 15.<\/p>\n Of 77 million people vaccinated in the United States, there have been\u00a05,800 such \u201cbreakthrough infections<\/a>,\u201d Walensky said, including 396 people who required hospitalization and 74 who died.<\/p>\n Walensky said some of these infections have occurred because the vaccinated person didn\u2019t mount a strong immune response. But the concern is that in some cases, they\u2019re occurring in people infected by more contagious virus variants.<\/p>\n