By Amy Judd, Global News

Health

B.C. health officials recommend a fall booster for COVID-19

Jul 8, 2022 | 2:34 PM

B.C. health officials Friday issued a recommendation that eligible residents receive a fall booster for COVID-19 in the fall.

This comes as B.C. is seeing a rise in the Omicron BA.5 variant, Acting Provincial Health Officer Dr. Martin Lavoie said Friday.

Details are still being released but officials say everyone 65 and over will be receiving an invite first and then everyone from age 12 to 64 in an age-based rollout.

Residents 11 years old and under are not eligible for any booster shot.

Lavoie is urging anyone over the age of 70 who are eligible for the second booster dose to get the injection soon. They would have received an invite to do so.

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Dr. Penny Ballem, executive lead of the B.C. immunization rollout said Friday they are hoping that a vaccine for children from six months to five years old will be approved by the end of July and then those vaccine appointments will be rolled into the other child immunization clinics.

The National Advisory Committee on Immunization (NACI) has already recommended vaccine booster shots this fall.

While 2.8 million British Columbians have received a third dose of the vaccine, Health Minister Adrian Dix said earlier in the week an additional 1.3 million people are eligible for their third dose right now in the province and have not yet received it.

In June, federal health officials urged Canadians to get booster doses of the COVID-19 vaccine in advance of the possible resurgence of the virus in the fall.

While case counts and other indicators are stable or declining in most parts of Canada, the virus remains in circulation and could begin spreading further during the fall respiratory virus season, Canada’s chief health officer, Dr. Theresa Tam, said on June 30.

In B.C. more than 225,000 doses COVID-19 vaccine are set to expire at the end of July.

Another 430,000 of Pfizer’s Comirnaty doses are set to expire before Nov. 30, and close to 40,000 of its pediatric vaccine doses will expire before Sept. 30.

B.C. is in the midst of a third wave of Omicron, which is expected to increase rapidly in the coming weeks, one COVID-19 modelling expert said last week.

Dr. Sally Otto, an evolutionary biologist and professor at the University of British Columbia, said at the Evolution Conference in Ohio last week that the BA.5 variant is circulating in more communities once again and she is predicting the third wave will reach its peak sometime next month.