As Covid cases are cratering across the U.S., so is the nation’s booster rollout, per data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
Around 193,000 Americans are receiving the additional shot every day, dropping over 70 percent over the past month from around 650,000 per day on January 15. The rollout peaked in early December with 1.1 million people receiving the additional shot every day.
This is the lowest daily booster uptake total since the extra shots were made available in late-September.
This matches the trends of the Delta variant surge, where vaccination rates in America began to rise when the variant first started to make its impact in August, before stagnating – and eventually dropping – as cases started to stagnate and Americans became indifferent to the shot.
COVID-19 booster shot uptake peaked in early December when Omicron first arrived in the U.S., but has since cratered are reached its lowest point since the additional shot first became available in late-September
Around 70% of Americans that are eligible for a COVID-19 booster shot have received it, along with 42% of the overall population. Pictured: A man in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, receives a shot of a COVID-19 vaccine
In early December, Americans were made aware of the new threat of the vaccine-resistant Omicron variant, spurring many that were either procrastinating with their booster or not planning on getting it all to get the shot.
That group of people has received the shot at this point, though, leaving a small group of people still lining up for the booster.
Indifference will begin to creep in as well, as Covid cases are sharply declining in the U.S. – down 43 percent over the past week to 150,714 cases per day – and have fallen far from the 800,000 case per day average from mid-January.
Data from the Kaiser Family Foundation, cited by CDC and White House officials last week, finds that 70 percent of Americans eligible for a booster shot have received it.
Getting the remaining fully vaccinated yet unboosted population to get the next shot may be a challenge, though.
Covid vaccine uptake in the U.S. started to rise in late summer when the Delta variant took over as the dominant strain. Demand for the shots went up again this winter as Omicron began to take hold in the states
Of the 30 percent of vaccinated Americans that are unboosted, only 40 percent are planning to get the shot ‘as soon as possible’, with 30 percent saying they will ‘definitely not’ get boosted.
That figure has remained steady as well, signaling that those that have made the choice not to get boosted are likely steadfast in that belief.
Health officials are hoping these booster shot could spell the end of the pandemic, but cratering booster uptake could throw a wrench into that plan.
The increasing Covid vaccination rate combined, the highly infectious Omicron variant being more mild than other strains and how quickly the variant seemed to have run out of steam after erupting across American late last year has many hopeful the virus could soon reach an endemic state.
This is reliant on people getting vaccinated, though, and indifference could set in once cases get low enough – and it may take yet another surge to convince remaining stragglers to get the additional jab.
It also spells bad news for the future of the Covid vaccines going forward. It has already been hard enough for health officials to get people their first three shots – and a fourth may be around the corner.
According to official data from the CDC, 76 percent of Americans have received at least one shot of a vaccine, and 64 percent are fully vaccinated.
Only 42 percent of Americans in total have received a booster shot.
Fourth doses have already been made available to immunocompromised Americans, though, and countries like Israel have also started the process of getting the next shot into arms.
Dr Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, has said in recent weeks that a fourth shot will likely be necessary in the future to shore up protection against Omicron.