Ask The Doctors: J&J Booster, Pfizer For Kids

Those who got the Johnson and Johnson vaccine finally got a boost, so to speak, this week. The company announced that a second shot of the vaccine provides 94 percent protection against symptomatic COVID-19 infection, bringing its numbers up to Moderna or Pfizer-level protection. They have submitted the numbers to the Food and Drug Administration for booster consideration.

This after confusing messages on booster shots from the White House and then the FDA. And after Pfizer announced promising results of studies on its vaccine for children between the ages of 5 and 11.

Massachusetts announced more than 4,000 new COVID cases over the weekend, as positivity rate stays at 2 percent. With school infections, we wonder: are things getting better? Where are we on COVID?

We take listener calls with Dr. Philip Landrigan, a pediatrician, public health physician, epidemiologist, and Director of the Program for Global Public Health and the Common Good at Boston College, and Dr. Shira Doron, infectious disease physician and hospital epidemiologist at Tufts Medical Center.