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In mid-September, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommended the newest vaccine targeting Omicron subvariants being provided by both Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna for everyone 6 months of age and older.
Another updated vaccine, this one from Novavax, became available this month and is recommended for those aged 12 and over.
The rollout of this year's booster was marked early on by some distribution offers, forcing some providers to cancel scheduled vaccine appointments.
The new vaccine has now been available for about a month.
Six weeks after last year's bivalent COVID booster was made available, over 18 million people had received a dose by the middle of October 2022, according to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).
The CDC said earlier this month that those aged 65 and above accounted for 62.9 percent of COVID-related hospitalizations from January to August of this year.
Among that group, only 23.5 percent had received the recommended COVID booster vaccine, and "the vast majority had two or more underlying health conditions," according to the CDC.
COVID-19 vaccines are available free to everyone 6 months and older living in the United States, regardless of immigration or insurance status.
To find out where to get a vaccine near you, enter your zip code on this site from HHS or text your zip code to 438829.
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