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During a recently aired interview, Bourla said that patients will “likely” need an additional dose of the vaccine within 12 months of becoming fully vaccinated with the two required doses.
Bourla said that they are continuing to monitor the situation, and as more COVID-19 variants arise, the company may be forced to shift gears.
“We need to see what would be the sequence, and for how often we need to do that, that remains to be seen," he said on CNBC.
“A 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, but all of that needs to be confirmed. And again, the variants will play a key role.”
The announcement from Bourla comes on the heels of Moderna stating that the company hopes to have its booster ready by the fall to avoid a winter surge similar to what happened during the holiday season.
According to Pfizer, its vaccine is more than 91 percent effective at protecting against COVID-19, and maintains that effectiveness for more than six months, similar to Moderna.
David Kessler, the COVID-19 response chief science officer for President Joe Biden’s administration warned that Americans can expect to receive booster shots moving forward to protect against new strains and variants of the virus.
“We don’t know everything at this moment,” he told the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis. “We are studying the durability of the antibody response.
“It seems strong but there is some waning of that and no doubt the variants challenge ... they make these vaccines work harder. So I think for planning purposes, planning purposes only, I think we should expect that we may have to boost.”
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