A wave of new COVID-19 vaccines appears to be on the horizon, bringing with them the expanded possibilities of reaching people outside traditional health care settings and with only one dose.
Two vaccines, from Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna, have been granted emergency approval by the Federal Drug Administration. Those are the vaccines Tennesseans have been receiving so far.
A new vaccine developed by Johnson & Johnson, which has applied for FDA approval, could receive approval by the end of this month. And promising clinical trial data for vaccines developed by Oxford University/Astrazeneca and Novavax seemingly puts those candidates on track for FDA approval as well.
The vaccines are not the same. They were developed with different technologies, are stored at different temperatures and, most importantly, require a different number of shots.
But experts and public health officials say the vaccine options have one critical thing in common: they are immensely effective at preventing hospitalizations and severe bouts of COVID-19.