- Experts say that it’s important for people to follow through with second doses of Moderna and Pfizer COVID-19 vaccines.
- They say that the odds of being hospitalized or becoming seriously ill drop dramatically after a second shot.
- A second dose can be administered up to 6 weeks after a first shot.
It’s the new rallying cry of infectious disease experts across the United States.
“Get your second dose.”
With nearly a third of the U.S. population now fully vaccinated, a worrisome trend has popped up, according to those experts.
Some people are choosing to take the first of the two-shot series required with both Pfizer and Moderna vaccinations but are opting out of the second shot.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that about 8 percent of people who have received a first shot of the two-shot vaccines have missed their second shot.
Officials are digging into the situation and speaking out about why getting both shots in the two-shot series is critical.
They say that the second dose not only builds herd immunity, but also strengthens the protection from serious COVID-19 illness and complications.
“Many have the illusion they are completely protected (with one of the two shots), but they are not,” Dr. William Schaffner, an infectious disease expert at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine in Nashville, Tennessee, told Healthline. “Some may lose their prevention ability sooner, and they won’t know it.”
The first shot is “priming the pump,” Schaffner said, and “the second dose brings up the water.”
Source: healthline