The FDA intends to authorize booster doses of Pfizer-BioNTech’s coronavirus vaccine for all adults as early as November 18, a move that would expand the number of Americans eligible for additional shots by tens of millions.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s independent committee of vaccine experts has scheduled a meeting for November 19 to discuss data on the booster dose’s efficacy and safety. If both the FDA and the CDC sign off in that time frame, they will have acted strikingly quickly — a little more than a week after Pfizer asked for authorization of boosters for everyone 18 and older.