Pfizer Asks US Regulators to Authorize COVID-19 Vaccine Boosters for All Adults

Pfizer wants clearance for booster shots of its COVID-19 vaccine for all American adults, the company announced Tuesday.

Rebuffed in September by experts on a Food and Drug Administration (FDA) vaccine advisory panel, the company is trying again, pointing to data from a recent trial examining the safety and efficacy of boosters in a more than 10,000 people 16 or older.

The trial showed that a third dose of Pfizer’s jab boosted efficacy to 95.6 percent, Pfizer and its partner BioNTech said, much higher than the effectiveness seen recently in real-world settings.

They also said the trial revealed no safety concerns.

“These important data add to the body of evidence suggesting that a booster dose of our vaccine can help protect a broad population of people from this virus and its variants,” Dr. Ugur Sahin, CEO and co-founder of BioNTech, said in a statement last month.