No One Will Stop You From Getting Whatever Booster You Want
The CDC indicated that it would move toward a hands-off stance: Booster-eligible people should stick with one brand, but may mix and match at will.

Mixing and matching vaccine brands is officially on the table in the United States. But that option might soon be billed as the B-list choice.

Last night, CDC Director Rochelle Walensky gave the green light for Moderna and Johnson & Johnson booster shots, the long-awaited follow-up to a similar recommendation given to the Pfizer formulation last month. As the endorsement stands, all who are eligible for an additional jab—which now includes tens of millions more Americans—should be able to pick whatever booster brand they like. But discussions among a panel of experts who advised Walensky hinted at a catch: The agency has yet to issue its final clinical guidance on who, specifically, might want to boost with what—and an early draft of the recommendations suggests that Americans “should” stick with the same brand they got in their first go-round.

Switching to a different shot would be allowed, as was authorized by the FDA on Wednesday; per the draft CDC guidance, people may opt to mix and match based on availability or preference, after assessing their individual risks and benefits. (As a reminder, the FDA’s authorizations tell Americans what vaccines they’re allowed to get. The CDC follows that up with advice on what folks should do with those options.)

The CDC’s stance on mixing and matching, then, could end up being a relatively soft one, neither extolment nor excoriation. That might also be the most practical course of action for the agency, given the variables involved and the lack of clear-cut evidence that could untangle them. But the wishy-washiness of Pick whatever is confusing as hell.

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