The San Francisco Department of Public Health and Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital announced that they will allow patients who received a single dose of the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine to obtain a second dose of either the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccines. This decision comes in response to requests from American citizens in the city, who have expressed doubts about the efficacy of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine against the Delta variant, which has been spreading. Recent studies have supported these concerns, showing that this vaccine is the least effective among its American counterparts against COVID-19 variants.
However, health officials stated in a release that recipients of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine can request a special "supplemental dose" of an mRNA vaccine, while refusing to label these second doses as "boosters." The Johnson & Johnson vaccine requires only one dose, and recipients are considered fully vaccinated two weeks after receiving the shot.
Officials attributed the decision to allow patients to receive additional doses to the high number of requests they have received from residents, reaffirming that the Johnson & Johnson vaccine is very effective against the virus and its variants, according to a report by CNBC, which was reviewed by Al Arabiya.
For her part, Navina Bhopal, the Deputy Director of Health at the San Francisco Department of Public Health, stated: "We have received requests based on patients talking to their doctors, which is why we allow additional doses."
The Department of Public Health said in a statement: "This step does not represent a change in policy for the San Francisco health department. We continue to adhere to the guidelines of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and do not recommend receiving a booster dose at this time. We will continue to review any new data and adjust our guidelines if necessary."
The U.S. CDC currently does not recommend mixing COVID vaccine doses in most circumstances. The announcement from health officials in San Francisco comes at a time when some Americans are seeking ways to obtain additional COVID vaccine doses, with some even going so far as to receive extra shots from different manufacturers due to concerns about the highly contagious Delta variant.
