Vaccines
Ronald Bailey | 1.18.2024 3:45 PM
Flailing GOP presidential candidate Gov. Ron DeSantis will apparently repeat any lie that he thinks will endear him to the Trump wing of the Republican Party. One of the more egregious examples is his recent assertion: "Every booster you take, you're more likely to get COVID as a result of it." Total bullshit.
It's not clear whence the governor got his misinformed soundbite, but the internet is filled with similar bogus claims by anti-COVID vaccine YouTube grifters like retired British nurse educator John Campbell. So what is really the case?
The governor's assertion probably stems from a likely deliberate misinterpretation of an August 2023 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) risk assessment summarizing the possible efficacy of current COVID vaccines against the then-new COVID BA.2.86 variant. COVID vaccines are formulated to target specific variants of the virus. The most recent booster targets the XBB.1.5 omicron variant. However, the virus is constantly mutating and throwing up new variants that might break through immune protection that has been primed by a booster to fight XBB.1.5 variant. This is the question that the CDC's August assessment aimed to address with reference to the BA.2.86........