Over 90,000 J&J recipients went back for unauthorized dose

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Over 90,000 people who received the Johnson & Johnson one-shot COVID-19 vaccine returned for one or more additional unauthorized doses, experts advising the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said Friday.

Fully vaccinated, non-immunocompromised individuals do not need an additional vaccine dose right now, the FDA reiterated Thursday while announcing expanded emergency use of Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccines to authorize a booster shot for certain immunocompromised patients.

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Some 90,979 J&J shot recipients returned for one or more additional COVID-19 vaccine doses, or less than 1% of approximately 12 million J&J jab recipients, according to slides presented during an Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) meeting. It wasn't clear whether they sought additional vaccine under a physician's guidance.

Though concerns have surfaced over potentially reduced vaccine protection in the face of concerning viral variants, Johnson & Johnson recently told Fox News it remains confident in its COVID-19 vaccine's ability to prevent severe illness, hospitalization and death amid the spread of the highly transmissible delta variant.

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"All authorized COVID-19 vaccines have been shown to help prevent infection and reduce the severity of illness, which is why COVID-19 vaccinations are such an important tool to help end the pandemic," J&J told Fox News earlier this month. "As noted by the CDC, though a small percentage of people who are fully vaccinated can still get COVID-19, developing severe illness is still a rare occurrence."

Also, some 1.14 million people who received the two-dose Pfizer or Moderna COVID-19 vaccines also returned for at least one additional unauthorized dose, against a backdrop of nearly 140 million mRNA shot recipients, or less than 1%. 

The CDC advisory panel is set to vote whether additional doses should be administered to certain immunocompromised patients later Friday.