Boosters not enough to blunt Omicron wave, experts say: ‘There isn’t time’

Omicron is spreading faster than we can give people third doses of COVID-19 vaccine, experts say, though it's still worth getting a third shot.

Ontario opened up appointments for COVID-19 booster shots on Monday morning — and in many regions, they were gone in minutes.

While demand is high for third doses of COVID-19 vaccine, the supply can’t keep up, and experts say we can’t beat the Omicron variant wave through vaccination alone.

“There isn’t time,” said Colin Furness, an infection control epidemiologist and assistant professor at the University of Toronto.

“The fact of the matter is that we have millions of these to deliver and we need time to do that. And we also need time for them to take effect.”

Given that it takes around two weeks for your immune system to develop a good antibody response to a third dose, he said, it could take until March before most of the population is protected.

“The Omicron wave will be done by then,” he said.

Nazeem Muhajarine, an epidemiologist and professor at the University of Saskatchewan, thinks that Omicron just spreads too quickly.

“I think what we are seeing with Omicron is an unprecedented ferocity in the way that it is spreading,” Muhajarine said.