BC Health Officials to potentially share information on second dose timelines today

During Tuesday’s press conference surrounding BC’s four-step restart plan, Dr. Bonnie Henry spoke briefly about moving up the timeline for second doses of vaccine in the province.

“We are reducing the gap for second doses for everybody now that we have more vaccine supply. But it is a balancing because there is some good data that has come out recently that has shown that especially in older people that extending that interval out to three months means they had a stronger immune response,” said Henry.

The province’s top doctor also spoke to potential issues with supply of the Moderna vaccine.

“It is a concern about Moderna but we’ve been working with the National Advisory Committee and the recommendations about being able to provide a second dose with the same platform, a messenger RNA vaccine. We know that people who got Moderna first can get a second dose of Pfizer if needed. We will be looking at whether we need to do that,” added Henry.

According to Dr. Henry the province may not see its next shipment of Moderna vaccines until later in June.

This afternoon at 2:00 pm, Dr. Henry and Minister Adrian Dix will present the latest COVID-19 data.