(The Center Square) – The Georgia Department of Public Health is not administering COVID-19 boosters as it waits to hear from a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention committee.
Department officials said in a release they do not have any of the updated boosters and have been advised to 2024-2025 COVID-19 vaccine for safety reasons.
The CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices will hold a two-day meeting beginning Sept. 18, according to Georgia health officials. The committee is expected to give more guidance on the latest booster. The department said this has been protocol since the first vaccines.
Last week, U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy announced new restrictions on COVID-19 vaccines that would limit them to adults 65 and older and younger people with medical conditions that put them at a high risk of severe COVID-19.
Kennedy has questioned the efficacy of the COVID-19 vaccines and other vaccinations. He said the new restrictions were a step in the right direction as part of a “framework” he promised Americans he would use in a social media post.
The debate over COVID-19 has drawn the attention of President Donald Trump, who has claimed credit for getting the first COVID-19 vaccines out quickly in what he called “Operation Warp Speed.” The president called for answers in a post on Truth Social.
“I have been shown information from Pfizer, and others, that is extraordinary, but they never seem to show those results to the public. Why not???” Trump said in the post. “They go off to the next ‘hunt’ and let everyone rip themselves apart, including Bobby Kennedy Jr. and CDC, trying to figure out the success or failure of the Drug Companies’ COVID work. They show me GREAT numbers and results, but they don’t seem to be showing them to many others. I want them to show them NOW, to CDC and the public, and clear up this MESS, one way or the other!!!”
U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff, D-Ga., is calling for Kennedy to resign amid questions about Kennedy’s vaccine policies and firings at the CDC, which is based in Atlanta. He held a news conference on Thursday ahead of Kennedy’s testimony to a Senate committee.
“Every day that this continues, more and more Americans are put at risk by Mr. Kennedy’s radical and incoherent ideology,” Ossoff said.
