FDA on cusp of deciding whether now is the time for vaccine boosters

With President Joe Biden ready for Americans to start getting booster shots as early as next week, vaccine experts advising the FDA are debating the merits.

With President Joe Biden ready to pull the trigger on booster shots as early as next week, vaccine experts advising the U.S. Food and Drug Administration huddled Friday to debate the merits of third doses of the Pfizer vaccine for people 16 and older.

Members of the FDA's Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee scrutinized new data from Israel and questioned whether boosters are really necessary, particularly among younger populations.

The debate has become unusually charged, in part because of White House involvement. Biden said he would only act on rolling out boosters if the FDA and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention agreed. But his public pronouncement that the rollout would begin as early as Monday suggested the decision was a foregone conclusion, leading to accusations by some scientists that the Biden administration was pressuring independent regulators.

"We know that there may be differing opinions as to the interpretation of the data regarding the potential need for additional doses, and we strongly encourage all the different viewpoints to be voiced and discussed regarding the data, which is complex and evolving," said Peter Marks, director of the FDA's Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research.