Should You Get a COVID Booster Now — or Wait Until Fall?

Still, tallies from the CDC show the vast majority of the 50-plus population is lagging behind on boosters. As of July 20, less than 30 percent of adults 50 and older who were eligible for a second boost had received one. 

That could be due to an overall feeling that things are less dangerous now than they were in 2020, says Svea Closser, a medical anthropologist and associate professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. As the pandemic persists, the risks of COVID-19 have “sort of faded from our consciousness a little bit,” she adds. But the evidence is clear, Closser says: The second booster is “actually really important” when it comes to reducing the risk of hospitalization among older adults.

In May, unvaccinated individuals ages 50 to 64 were 3.4 times more likely to be hospitalized with COVID-19 compared to their peers who are up to date on their shots, CDC data show. That hospitalization rate is slightly higher (3.8) among adults 65 and older. 

It’s not clear when the new vaccines will be ready

Another reason not to fall behind on your booster schedule: It’s still unclear when, exactly, the next generation of shots will be available. The Health and Human Services Department on July 29 announced that the new vaccines could be here by early fall, but Jha said in previous press conferences that it could be a bit longer before their distribution is more widespread.

Clinical trial data still needs to be submitted. And federal agencies and independent experts need to review and recommend the shots — a process that, even under urgent circumstances, can still take some time. Among those recommendations would be the wait time, if any, to receive a new bivalent booster after receiving one of the currently available COVID vaccines.

There’s also the possibility that we’re dealing with another dominant variant this fall, different from the ones the new vaccines are designed to target.

“Given the unknowns that still exist, when it comes to my parents, my advice is still get that second booster. It’s a couple of months [until the new shots are potentially available], we don’t know what’s going to happen in the meantime, and we do know that getting a booster now is going to help,” Closser says.

A recent infection may not protect you for long

If you were infected with previous variants that were circulating in 2020 and 2021, coming down with COVID-19 again was unlikely — at least for a few months. “You had about a 90-day warranty,” Jha said. “And it wasn’t ironclad, but [there was a] high likelihood that you weren’t going to get reinfected within 90 days.”

That warranty may be much weaker now in the face of BA.5, health officials say. So if you were among the millions of people who caught COVID-19 this spring, don’t rely on that previous infection preventing another this summer.

You don’t need to wait too long after a bout of COVID-19 to get your next vaccine dose, either. The CDC says you can get one as soon as you’re out of isolation.

If you had your second booster already, experts say the usual pandemic precautions can add layers of protection against COVID-19 until the new vaccines are out: Wear a mask in crowded indoor areas and avoid poorly ventilated spaces. And if you do test positive for COVID-19, talk to your doctor or pharmacist about taking an oral antiviral that’s been proven to reduce hospitalization by nearly 90 percent in high-risk individuals.

“I want to emphasize that these are extremely safe vaccines,” Deming says. “If you want to be extra safe to protect yourself, your family, your community, this is a very easy way to help the people you care about.”