TAMPA, Fla. There are a lot of people who have been doing it. Theyve been mixing the doses, said Dr. Jill Roberts, Associate Professor at the University of South Florida College of Public Health.
Doctors say people have been getting different kinds of COIVD-19 vaccine shots.
The biggest concern of course is that we never studied that and so theres no indication that if you get the Moderna shot, youre going to boost what Pfizer already did. And so essentially instead of acting like a booster, it acts like a different shot. Almost as if you got vaccinated by something different, said Roberts.
At this point, Pfizer is the only vaccine thats been given emergency use authorization to allow certain booster doses.
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Experts say thats why some people whove gotten Johnson & Johnson or Moderna shots have chosen to also get a Pfizer booster.
If youre concerned, if you really think that you need to have that booster shot, you want to boost the right thing, said Roberts.
One problem with that is, there are no safety or efficacy data on mixing doses.
I cant tell you it worked if you actually did that, said Roberts.
Doctors say people are also getting extra doses of their Johnson & Johnson or Modern shots, even though booster shots for those vaccines havent been authorized yet.
A lot of us in the age group that were talking about right now werent even vaccinated until April or May. So were not at that eight months time period anyway. So again you need to wait eight months before you get that booster shot so you might as well wait to see what happens with Moderna and J&J, said Roberts.
How is all of this happening? There was some initial confusion over who could get a booster. Also, experts say because COVID-19 vaccines are available all over, you can get a shot without submitting any medical paperwork.
So that person who is going to give you the shot or authorize that shot has no idea what your previous dose was or which shot you got before, said Roberts.
Doctors strongly advise against doing this.
It also prevents researchers from accurately tracking vaccine data.
Really it kind of creates a problem for monitoring and so we know from the clinical trial the boost looks fine. But until we get out it to thousands and thousands and thousands of people we dont have a full data set, said Roberts.
The FDA Advisory Committee is meeting this week to discuss expanding emergency use authorization to include more booster doses.
Theyll talk about Moderna on October 14 and Johnson & Johnson on October 15.
Always what I would say to anybody if you dont know what you should do, call your primary care physician and ask. Tell them what your history is. Tell that which shots you have or have not been given and ask them whats my next step, said Roberts.
Rome Central Rome was gripped with violence this weekend as thousands of protesters marched against the toughest new vaccine mandates in the world. All Italians will soon be required to show a coronavirus "Green Pass," proving either vaccination, recovery in the past six months, or a negative COVID-19 test from the past 48 hours to enter their workplaces.
What started off as a restless but peaceful demonstration against the looming measure in Rome's Piazza del Popolo ended up sparking a tinderbox when an offshoot of protesters stormed the headquarters of CGIL, Italy's oldest and biggest labor union.
When they marched toward the prime minister's office, police responded with water cannon and tear gas. Dozens of police officers were hurt in the melee.
In a bizarre twist, the unrest created a security incident for U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who was in Rome for a meeting with foreign leaders, including Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi and Pope Francis. She was attending Mass at St. Patrick's Church and scheduled to give a reading when the chaos outside moved Italian government officials to remove the speaker and her husband from the premises.
Loud chants of "liberta'" (freedom) echoed throughout the Eternal City. Freedom, the protesters demanded, from the national vaccine mandate scheduled to go into effect on October 15.
The Green Pass has been required in Italy since August for anyone wishing to dine indoors, use long-distance trains or almost any form of leisure activity. But the new restrictions go further than any other country in the world, and some workers face suspension without pay if they fail to comply.
"I consider this to be criminal and cowardly blackmail by our highest institutions," said Maria Ballarin, a retiree who joined the march.
"There will finally be a revolution in Italy," said another protester, Carolina, who works in the fashion industry. "We won't go to work."
Some of the protesters accused of violence have been identified as card-carrying members of a neo-fascist political group. Roberto Fiore, the leader of the extreme-right group Forza Nuova, was among 12 people arrested. Forza Nuova remained unapologetic after the rioting.
"The popular revolution will not stop, with or without us, until the Green Pass is definitively withdrawn," the group said in a statement. "Saturday was a watershed between the old and the new. The people decided to raise the level of the clash."
Some Italian lawmakers are calling for such groups to be dismantled, recalling the 20-year fascist rule of dictator Benito Mussolini, who took over Italy's government almost 100 years go.
"The events... take us back to the darkest and most dramatic moments of our history and they are an extremely serious and unacceptable attack on democracy," said Valeria Fedeli, a Senator for the center-left Democratic Party.
Police said they had identified about 600 people who took part in the violence after studying video.
Despite the outrage of some over the national vaccine mandates, however, it's a minority opinion in Italy, where 80% of residents over the age of 12 are already fully vaccinated a government target that was reached on Saturday, the same day as the protests.
Only about 66% of over-12s in the U.S. have been fully vaccinated.
Polls show that most Italians believe the new rules will help ensure the hell of last year when the country literally ran out of space to bury its dead never happens again.
Italy has registered 131,274 deaths linked to COVID-19 since February last year, the second-highest toll in Europe after Britain and the ninth-highest in the world.
Hospitalizations have been steadily declining since early summer.
Chris Livesay is a CBS News foreign correspondent based in Rome.
INDIANAPOLIS Data from the Indiana Department of Health shows a mostly steady decline in first and second doses of COVID-19 vaccinations.
Data from the Indiana Department of Health shows during the delta surge, first- and second-dose vaccinations peaked at a 7-day average of more than 12,000 per day in late August.
As of Friday, that number has dropped by half to a 7-day average of 6,080 first- and second-dose vaccinations a day.
Several Indiana vaccine providers say theyve seen the decline firsthand.
We are getting some that are coming in for their first and second dose, but the majority are the boosters, said Tracy Anderson, COVID-19 vaccine clinics manager for Community Health Network. I would say 80% at least are booster.
Anderson said her team is focused on reaching more students by running vaccine clinics at schools.
We wanted to make sure that population had the opportunity to get vaccinated, and its not always easy for those parents to get to clinics, she said.
Other providers are also working to make the vaccine available in more places.
I just got off a call with community outreach getting into some of our high-risk community settings and offering vaccines there, said Mary Kay Foster, special pathogens program manager for IU Health.
Foster said she believes health care providers need to educate patients about the potential consequences of COVID if theyre not vaccinated.
What that hospital bill is going to be like, she said. I dont think people realize how expensive the care for COVID truly is.
Data from the state health department shows 56.4% of eligible Hoosiers are fully vaccinated.
On Friday, Gov. Eric Holcomb acknowledged it will take time to convince some Hoosiers to get the shot.
Well continue to lean into making sure that those resources are readily accessible, easy to access, and we try to be as persuasive as we can, Holcomb said.
Health officials urge people who have questions about the vaccine to speak with their doctor.
The Indiana Department of Health has not posted data on booster shots to the vaccine dashboard yet, but officials hope to get make that information available soon, according to a spokesperson.
A petition to mandate coronavirus vaccines for all eligible students and staff in Virginia schools has accumulated nearly 6,000 comments online setting a record for the Virginia Department of Healths typically sleepy regulatory process.
The request was submitted last month as a public petition to the Virginia Board of Health. Under state law, any resident can ask an agency to craft new regulations, according to Joseph Hilbert, VDHs deputy commissioner for governmental and regulatory affairs.
But amid ongoing debates over requiring COVID-19 immunizations for students both in Virginia and across the country the public petition process presents a unique way for concerned parents to make their case. The Virginia Department of Health must consider the request, even as state leaders appear reluctant to broach the issue.
Gov. Ralph Northam has so far been hesitant to implement a statewide requirement, saying its a decision that would have to be passed by the General Assembly. James Lane, the states superintendent of public instruction, shares the same view. So far, California remains the only state to mandate the vaccines for all K-12 students, both in public and private schools.
Were in the process now of determining whether were going to grant this petition, Hilbert said. Honestly, we dont get a whole lot of them. And this one is a record-setter as far as the comments weve received.
The request was filed on Sept. 1, and the period for public comment ends Oct. 17. After that, the Virginia Department of Health has 90 days to issue a decision on whether or not to accept it a process that involves reviewing all 5,992 comments (most strongly in opposition to a potential requirement) currently submitted online.
At this point, Id be willing to bet that well probably get many, many more, Hilbert said. If the department granted the petition, it would kick off the process of crafting new regulations and determining how to implement the requirements statewide,
The petition specifically calls for the department to mandate COVID-19 vaccines both for all eligible students and for all eligible school employees, with only medical exemptions permitted. The petitioner, listed as Kristen Calleja, wrote that her 10th-grade daughter and all other kids have sacrificed much over the past 18 months. But with the school year already disrupted by infections and quarantines, she wrote, vaccine requirements are one of the only ways to ensure safe attendance.
My daughter and all other students should have a right to be able to attend school without being unnecessarily put at risk by other students and teachers who refuse to be vaccinated, Calleja said. The irrational minority should not be dictating the public health policy for Virginia or the schools. Attempts to reach Calleja for comment were unsuccessful.
Petitioning for the state to change its school immunization requirements through regulations, rather than legislation, is largely unprecedented. A 2020 law that updated Virginias school immunization requirements did include language allowing the Board of Health to fast-track changes or additions to the schedule. But its still not entirely clear whether the department can require COVID-19 vaccines for students without approval by the state legislature.
Theres a lot of overlap in the child immunization requirements between whats in the code and whats in our regulations, Hilbert said. But we would definitely work closely with the administration in making a determination on this petition.
Northams spokeswoman, Alena Yarmosky, pointed out that additions to Virginias immunization code have historically been decided by the General Assembly.
Governor Northam thinks thats appropriate, she said. We are still a long way from that point, as you know, since the COVID-19 vaccine has not yet been approved for children 5-12. Right now the governor is focused on our upcoming major effort to vaccinate children once FDA approves it for emergency use.
Children 12 and older are currently eligible for the Pfizer vaccine, and the company asked the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to authorize the shots for 5- to 11-year-olds on Thursday. That raises the possibility theyll become available for younger children within the next few weeks.
Children appear less vulnerable than adults to severe cases of COVID-19, but the rise of the delta variant led to an increase in childhood cases and hospitalizations. As a result, public health experts widely recommend vaccinating children to curb the spread of disease and reduce the risk of more serious infections.
Vaccinating adults is also one of the best ways of protecting children from the disease.
Americans are getting their COVID-19 vaccinations at a higher rate, according to newly updated figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The seven-day moving average pace of first doses accelerated for the first time in months, climbing for six consecutive days at the end of September.
The moving average showed 235,061 Americans started new COVID-19 vaccinations on September 25. That average climbed for six consecutive days to peak at 252,223 on September 30. Aside from single-day fluctuations, federal vaccination trends of first doses have mostly slowed since early August.
Overall, 76% of Americans eligible for a shot of COVID-19 vaccine have received at least one dose, and 66% are fully vaccinated.
This uptick comes as the Biden administration has been touting its efforts to promote vaccination requirements in the workplace, in hopes of strong-arming remaining holdouts into getting vaccinated.
"Folks, vaccination requirements work, and there's nothing new about them," President Biden said Thursday in Illinois, praising companies that have put vaccination mandates in place. "They've been around for decades. We've been living with these requirements throughout our lives."
The White House released a report this week crediting requirements imposed by organizations and companies with "significant progress" in raising vaccination rates, as well as an array of economic benefits.
The administration recently asked several large companies that do business with the federal government to impose vaccine mandates, including airlines. A spokesperson for the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services said the agency plans to issue emergency regulations requiring vaccinations in nursing homes and hospitals "in mid-to-late October." Mr. Biden said an emergency rule from the Labor Department's Occupational Safety and Health Administration that would require vaccinations at large companies is expected "shortly."
"In total, this Labor Department vaccination requirement will cover 100 million Americans, about two-thirds of all the people who work in America," the president said.
The recent acceleration in first doses has unfolded unevenly across the U.S. CDC data show half of states averaging around the same or a slower pace of first doses compared to the week prior.
Massachusetts, which this week became the second state to reach 90% of adult residents with at least one dose, has seen the fourth largest percentage increase in these vaccinations. First doses in Hawaii, the first to reach 90%, have mostly slowed in recent weeks.
Meanwhile, vaccinations among children have dropped nationwide, according to a weekly analysis by the American Academy of Pediatrics. First-dose vaccinations at the end of September slowed to "the lowest number since vaccines were available."
The surge in first doses came as many Americans flocked to receive booster shots. Since August 13, when the government authorized additional doses for some who are immunocompromised, 5,305,113 have received a booster shot of Pfizer's vaccine.
Pennsylvania is the most populous state to post a double-digit percentage increase in first doses.
"Pennsylvanians continue to step up to get vaccinated every day, and we are proud of our continued progress," Maggi Barton, deputy press secretary for Pennsylvania's health department, said in an email.
First doses in Pennsylvania have surged from below 9,000 daily on September 23 to over 15,000 earlier this month. Only New Hampshire has posted a larger percentage increase in first doses. Barton credited Pennsylvania's work "to educate and address vaccine hesitancy" with the uptick.
CBS News reporter covering public health and the pandemic.
WICHITA, Kan. (KSNW) Kansans are still showing up in big numbers to get the COVID-19 vaccine. The Kansas Department of Health and Environment shared this breakdown of COVID shots given since Friday morning:
Of Kansans who are eligible to get vaccinated, 62.07% have at least one dose of vaccine in them, and 55.48% are finished with the vaccine series.
The KDHE updates the states coronavirus data at the same time it updates the vaccine data.
It says 15 more Kansas deaths have been linked to COVID-19, bringing the states death toll to 6,142. It also reports 75 new COVID-19 hospitalizations since Friday. The KDHE does not track recoveries.
Over the weekend, 1,699 Kansans tested positive for the coronavirus, while 3,696 tested negative. Of those who tested positive, 28 have the COVID-19 delta variant.
Kansas and Oklahoma county coronavirus cases updated Oct. 11, 2021Kansas delta variant cases updated Oct. 11, 2021Sources:Kansas Department of Health and EnvironmentOklahoma State Department of Health
CLEVELAND, Ohio Lake, Cuyahoga and Medina counties have the highest COVID-19 vaccination rates among Northeast Ohio counties, according to Ohio Department of Health data updated Sunday. The rates are for vaccinations started.
Overall, 54.4% of Ohioans of all ages have started the immunization process, and 63.6% of those ages 12 and up have received at least one shot, according to ODH.
Here are the Northeast Ohio counties, ranked by highest to lowest percentages for vaccinations started:
All of Ohios 10 most populous counties have rates of vaccinations started at 50% or above. In Franklin County, the most populous Ohio county and home to Columbus, nearly 60% of its residents have received at least one COVID-19 vaccination shot.
Here are the vaccination rates in Ohios 10 most populous counties. Counties are ranked by percentage of vaccinations started; county rank by population is in parentheses.
Dayton is the county seat of Montgomery County, Toledo is the county seat of Lucas County and Butler County is part of the Cincinnati metropolitan area.
Experts are split on whether the waning delta surge will be the last major COVID-19 wave to strike the U.S., as Americans grow eager for the pandemic to end after 19 months.
The vaccination rate and decreasing cases in most states have provided a ray of hope that the pandemic could be winding down after its final large wave, some experts say.
But other public health experts caution the unpredictability of the virus suggests another surge could still happen as the country braces for winter which led to skyrocketing cases, deaths and hospitalizations last year.
Nicholas Reich, a professor of biostatistics at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, said declaring there wont be another major wave after delta feels like a premature and bold statement.
Is there a chance? Sure, but I feel like if there's one thing we've learned from this, it's that there's a lot more sort of uncertainty and randomness in COVID then we've given it credit for so far, he said.
Some experts, including Reich, pointed out that factors such as the potential development of variants and the unknown endurance of immunity after infection and vaccination could spark larger-scale rises in COVID-19 cases after the country has seen a national decline.
The downturn in cases comes after the delta strain fueled a spike, reaching a seven-day average of more than 175,000 daily cases in mid-September. But on Thursday, that average dropped below 100,000 for the first time since Aug. 4, according to data from The New York Times.
Overall, 39 states have seen their seven-day averages of COVID-19 cases fall within the past two weeks. Despite these drops in cases, COVID-19 is not eliminated and many hundreds of thousands of people are still gonna get infected as the pandemic continues, Reich said.
While COVID-19 numbers are moving in the right direction, some areas of the country, including Alaska and West Virginia, are still very much in the midst of the delta wave, said Leana Wen, an emergency physician and public health professor at George Washington University.
I'm very concerned about people becoming complacent because they think that the delta wave is passing us, she said. We have seen this happen before, where there is a rise in the number of cases, then a decline, and then people let down their guard. And as a result, we plateau at a very high level of cases. That's unacceptable.
The approaching winter season also makes it difficult to forecast future COVID-19 trends, as coronaviruses can more easily spread in colder weather and in indoor spaces. Last winter, the U.S. saw its highest surge of cases, hospitalizations and deaths amid holiday gatherings held before vaccines became widely available.
Christopher Murray, the director of the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington, said he expects cases to increase in the winter after bottoming out in October, but that it is likely to be lower than the delta surge.
I think some people will be surprised that it doesn't just keep going away, and that doesn't seem very likely, he said.
Wen of George Washington University said having just 56.2 percent of the total U.S. population fully vaccinated andfewer restrictions than last year leaves it uncertain that the delta wave could be the U.S.s final major COVID-19 surge.
I don't know how we could possibly say that considering we don't know what's going to come our way, Wen said.
I'm not sure how we can know for certain that the level of protection we have nailed through vaccination is sufficient, she said, adding shes hopeful the end is on the horizon with childrens vaccines, oral treatment and more testing.
Others, including former Food and Drug Administration (FDA) commissioner Scott Gottlieb, took a more optimistic stance, anticipating that cases wont rise to the summer delta levels again.
Barring something unexpected, Im of the opinion that this is the last major wave of infection, Gottlieb told The New York Times this week.
Amesh Adalja, a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins University Center for Health Security, told MSNBC on Friday that any rise in winter cases will likely be more decoupled from hospitalizations and deaths due to the increased immunity due to vaccines and infections.
Many more people have been vaccinated, so many more people have natural immunity from this big delta wave and unfortunately so many people have died that we probably wont see peaks that are anything like we saw in the past, especially when it comes to what matters which is hospitalization, serious disease and death, he said.
I think delta was hopefully the worst that this virus can throw at us, he added.
David Dowdy, an associate professor of epidemiology at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, said he thinks its unlikely that the U.S. will endure another COVID-19 wave to the level of the summer delta and previous winter surges.
With the vaccination level rising and a fair amount of the unvaccinated getting infected, Americans immunity is higher now than its ever been, he said.
The emergence of a new variant could potentially threaten that immunity if the strain evades the vaccines. But Dowdy said he doesnt expect that in the short-term, as delta has reigned as the dominant variant worldwide for months without another strain usurping it.
I think anyone who says that they can predict the future of this pandemic is probably lying to you, Dowdy said. But I think we have a lot of reasons to be optimistic that we will not see another massive wave the way that we have seen so far.
Top infectious diseases expertAnthony FauciAnthony FauciIt's time for Biden to eliminate one of Trump's worst immigration policies Foreign COVID misinformation helps fuel public health skepticism Watch live: White House COVID-19 response team holds briefing MORE said that he strongly suspects COVID-19 deaths will go down in the winter.
During an interview with Greta Van Susteren to be aired on Sunday, Fauci was asked if he expected another surge ofcoronavirus cases due to the delta variant or other variants such as mu this winter.
He responded thatit would depend on how well the United States is able to vaccinate the millions of Americans whohave not yetgotten a coronavirus shot.
Fortunately, right now, over the last few weeks, we've seen a turnaround in the slope in going down in both cases and hospitalizations. Deaths are still up, but it's really flattening, so it's a lagging indicator, Fauci told Van Susteren.
I strongly suspect that you're going to start seeing the deaths go down similar to the hospitalizations; how quickly they go down and how thoroughly they go down is going to depend a lot on a number of circumstances, which will be influenced by things like the colder weather, people doing things indoors, how well they go by the CDC [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] guidelines of, when you have a lot of infection in the community, even though you're vaccinated, when you are not home but outside congregate settings in the public, wearing masks, I think would be very prudent,he added.
Expertsare divided about whether this most recent COVID-19 surge of cases will be the last one.
Data from the CDC indicates that nationwide COVID-19 cases are generally starting to trend downward, but only about 56 percent of the countrys total population has been fully vaccinated. Colder weather, with more people being situated inside, could make it difficult to predict how well COVID-19 cases get tamped down later in the fall and upcoming winter given that that environment has allowed the virus to spread previously.
Leana Wen, public health professor at George Washington University and an emergency physician, told The Hillthat some states are still grappling with the latest delta wave.
I'm very concerned about people becoming complacent because they think that the delta wave is passing us, Wen said. We have seen this happen before, where there is a rise in the number of cases, then a decline, and then people let down their guard. And as a result, we plateau at a very high level of cases. That's unacceptable.
MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey has extended through the end of the month a COVID-19 state of emergency that relaxes some health care regulations.
The order was scheduled to expire Tuesday.
Ivey first ordered the limited, narrowly-focused state of emergency on Aug. 12, when a surge caused by the delta variant of the coronavirus and by Alabamas low vaccination rate was rising. The order was aimed at helping hospitals adjust to the caseload from the virus, al.comreported.
Alabamas case numbers and hospitalizations began to decline a few weeks later. The total number of patients in Alabama hospitals with COVID-19 fell under 1,000 on Friday, the first time its been that low since July. The number of newly reported cases per day in Alabama has dropped more than 70% since early September, the governors office said.
Despite that, the governors proclamation Friday said the pandemic persists and continues to present a serious threat to public health, taxing Alabama hospitals, many of which were already struggling to staff their facilities.
The proclamation relaxes some regulations to help allow expanded capacity in healthcare facilities, additional liability protections, increased authority for frontline health care personnel, and easier shipment of emergency equipment and supplies, the governors office said. It also allows out-of-state doctors, nurses, and pharmacists to practice in Alabama under expedited licenses or temporary permits.
