A group of senior U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) officials — including two who announced they will soon resign — have authored a report disagreeing with the White House’s plan to roll out COVID-19 vaccine boosters next week.
In a report published in in The Lancet on Monday, the 18 officials write that there is no evidence supporting the need for boosters because fully vaccinated people still have high levels of protection against hospitalization or death.
Instead, they say, vaccine doses should be donated to areas with lower vaccination rates to prevent the emergence of more COVID-19 variants.
Although the administration is ready to roll out boosters starting September 20, President Joe Biden said last week that any decisions — including when to authorize boosters and who should receive them — will be left up to the FDA and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
The group of FDA authors of the new report include Dr Marion Gruber and Dr Philip Krause, who plan to step down in the coming months due to disagreements over the rollout of vaccines.