President Joe Biden received a third shot of the Pfizer coronavirus vaccine on Monday afternoon, as a national booster shot campaign entered its fourth day.
Biden, 78, who received his second dose in January, held up the left sleeve of his dress shirt and got the extra jab in the South Court Auditorium in the White House complex around 1:12 p.m Eastern time. He spoke to the news media through a black mask as he received the booster.
The president has urged eligible Americans — those over 65, adults in long-term care facilities, people over 18 with underlying health conditions and front-line workers — to get a third shot of the Pfizer vaccine.
Federal authorities haven’t approved booster shots of the Moderna vaccine, which appears to provide particularly robust and long-lasting virus protection, or the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, which was the last of the three inoculations to be rolled out.
The U.S. began its campaign to get boosters into arms on Friday, after Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, overruled her own panel to cast a wider net of people eligible for the extra shots.
The panel, the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, did recommend shots for the elderly and people with underlying medical conditions. But it left front-line workers out.
The booster push has generated controversy, with some questioning the need for extra shots in the vaccine-rich U.S., while poor countries suffer from rock-bottom vaccination rates.
“We are doing more than every other nation in the world combined,” Biden said Monday, touting America’s commitment to donate shots to the rest of the world. “We’re going to do our part.”
He almost doubled America’s donation commitment last week, saying that the U.S. was buying an additional 500 million doses to ship to poor and middle-income nations.
Eligible Americans can receive the Pfizer booster six months after their second shot, according to CDC guidance. Biden has said 60 million people fit the bill in the U.S.
About 67% of U.S. adults have been fully vaccinated against COVID, according to federal figures.
Health authorities have said that increasing that number is the surest path out of that pandemic. But boosters are believed to offer additional protection to people at the most risk.
“Like your first and second shot, the booster shot is free and easily accessible,” Biden said Friday. But he noted, “The bottom line is: If you’re fully vaccinated, you’re highly protected from severe illness even if you get COVID-19.”
On Monday, he said first lady Jill Biden, 70, would also receive a booster.
“I think she’s teaching,” the president said. “But she’s going to get one.”
