SPOKANE, Wash. — The University of Washington (UW) School of Medicine announced that a new COVID-19 vaccine is available.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends that people get the 2024-2025 vaccine from Moderna or Pfizer-BioNTech due to the high number of cases.
“Locally, we're seeing very high levels of COVID,” says Seth Cohen, an infection-prevention specialist at UW Medicine.
Cohen says COVID-19 cases are on the rise and children going back to school will be at high risk of contracting various illnesses.
“We're actually seeing some of the highest test positivity in COVID since probably 2021," said Cohen, "These vaccines will continue to provide very good protection against severe illness, and that's really the most important thing from a public health standpoint.”
The CDC recommends the following guidelines for the new COVID-19 vaccine:
With no previous COVID-19 vaccinations:
- Ages 6 months to 4 years
- 2 doses of 2024–2025 Moderna or 3 doses of 2024–2025 Pfizer-BioNTech
- Ages 5 years and older
- 1 dose of 2024–2025 Moderna or 1 dose of 2024–2025 Pfizer-BioNTech
With previous doses of a COVID-19 vaccine:
- Ages 6 months to 4 years
- 1 or 2 doses of 2024–2025 mRNA vaccine from the same manufacturer as the initial vaccine depending on the number of prior doses
- Ages 5 years and older
- 1 dose of 2024–2025 Moderna or 1 dose of 2024–2025 Pfizer-BioNTech
The CDC does not currently recommend that people over the age of 65 receive an additional dose of the new vaccine unless they are immunocompromised.
For detailed information about the new vaccine and other CDC recommendations, visit the CDC website.
