Biden is expected to receive a Pfizer-BioNTech booster.

HomeUS Politics

Biden is expected to receive a Pfizer-BioNTech booster.

President Biden may have gotten ahead of the government’s scientists in announcing prematurely that virtually all Americans would begin getting cor


President Biden may have gotten ahead of the government’s scientists in announcing prematurely that virtually all Americans would begin getting coronavirus booster shots this fall, but he is now making a show of getting his own. The president is scheduled to make remarks and receive a Pfizer-BioNTech booster on Monday afternoon, according to the White House.

Mr. Biden’s third shot comes only days after federal regulators moved to allow millions of Americans to get Pfizer booster shots if individuals received a second dose of that vaccine at least six months ago and met new eligibility rules. Frontline workers, older people and younger adults with medical conditions or jobs that place them at higher risk got the green light following weeks of intense debate within regulatory agencies that left much of the American public confused about the specifics of the booster plan.

Mr. Biden has been vaccinated in public before when he got his first Pfzer dose last December, a contrast to his predecessor, Donald J. Trump, who received an early vaccine at the White House but did not talk about it at the time.

Mr. Biden, who at age 78 is eligible for a booster shot, has pursued the opposite strategy, and on Friday morning he said that he planned to get a booster “as soon as I can get it done.”

A Reuters/Ipsos national survey conducted Aug. 27-30 found that 76 percent of Americans who have received at least one shot of a vaccine want a booster. Only 6 percent do not, the poll found.

Mr. Biden asked on Friday for people who were not yet eligible to be patient. He said that his administration was “looking to the time when we’re going to be able to expand the booster shots, basically across the board,” and that boosters for the Moderna and Johnson & Johnson vaccines were likely in the offing.

“So I would just say, it’d be better to wait your turn in line, wait your turn to get there,” Mr. Biden said.



www.nytimes.com