Pfizer Inc.
PFE 1.16%
Chief Executive Albert Bourla said it is likely that people who receive Covid-19 vaccines will need booster shots and then annual vaccinations within a year of that to maintain their protection against the virus as it develops.
“The variants will play a key role. It is extremely important to suppress the pool of people susceptible to the virus, ”said Mr. Bourla at a virtual event hosted by CVS Health. Corp.
that aired on Thursday but was recorded on April 1.
“There are vaccines like polio where one dose is enough,” said Mr. Bourla. “And there are vaccines such as the flu that you need every year. The Covid virus is more like the flu virus than the polio virus. ”
Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla.
Photo:
tom brenner / Reuters
More research is needed to confirm the need for annual booster shots, he said. But he added that the need seemed likely to have been given for research so far.
The chief executive’s comments come as the US and other countries race to vaccinate as many people as possible and stay ahead of any variants that could bypass the shots.
Researchers still don’t know how long protection lasts from any of the Covid-19 vaccines, although they are studying the problem. New injections or boosters may be needed, vaccine experts say, if the virus mutates significantly enough.
In the rush to introduce vaccines for the new virus, companies and other vaccine researchers did not have time to determine how long shots would provide protection, or whether booster shots would be needed to ensure protection.
Pfizer and its partner, BioNTech SE
BNTX 6.12%
said recently that the injection remains very effective six months after the second dose, and they hope to provide more information on protection in the coming weeks after six months.
Health regulators began approving the use of the Pfizer-BioNTech shot in December, and the vaccine has been rolled out in dozens of countries. Since then, millions of people around the world have been vaccinated.
As highly communicable variants of coronavirus fly around the world, scientists are rushing to understand why these new versions of the virus are spreading faster and what this could mean for vaccination efforts. New research says the key may be the spike protein, which gives the coronavirus its unmistakable shape. Illustration: Nick Collingwood / WSJ
Mr. Bourla and other Pfizer executives have said since last year that annual or seasonal withdrawals were likely. In February, Pfizer and BioNTech began a human study to test whether a third dose of the companies’ vaccination could protect against emerging variants.
Modern Inc.
MRNA -0.10%
Executives have also said they expect boosters to be needed to ensure the protection of vaccinated people. The company recently began investigating whether a two-dose booster shot of its vaccine is effective against a variant of the virus.
Countries with high vaccination coverage will be ready to shift their focus to boosters, possibly by the end of this year, Moderna said at a company vaccine event this week. Moderna president Stephen Hoge said it is safe to assume boosters would be needed “annually, probably seasonally, even though the pandemic is raging in a non-seasonal way.”
Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech’s vaccines are based on a new gene-based technology called messenger RNA. The likelihood that periodic Covid-19 injections will be required is one of the reasons Pfizer executives have said the company plans to expand its vaccine business by becoming a leader in mRNA.
Write to Jared S. Hopkins at [email protected]
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Appeared in the April 16, 2021 print edition as “ Pfizer CEO Says Shots Probably Necessary Yearly. ”