Health Matters

COVID-19 MAY NOT BE A PUBLIChealth emergency anymore, but you still need your yearly shot. In fact, it seems to peak about twice a year: once during the traditional respiratory-disease season in the fall and winter, and once during summer.

- Alice Park

For that reason, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) now recommends that people in certain groups receive not one but two updated COVID-19 vaccines, spaced six months apart.

The advice follows a summer COVID-19 surge that led to more hospitalizations among the most vulnerable Americans-people 65 and older and those with weakened immune systems. For them, the CDC now recommends a second dose. While COVID-19 rates are currently low, health experts are concerned they could spike again during the holiday season, when people travel more and gather in larger groups. The guidance went a step further for people who are immunocompromised because of conditions like cancer; they can receive three or more doses a year, depending on how weakened their immune systems are and their potential exposure to COVID-19.