Live news: US panel recommends Covid jab standardisation to tackle dominant variants

US government advisers have recommended that Covid-19 jabs should be standardised to target the dominant strain of the virus in a move to simplify the nation’s vaccination programme.

Scientists on a Food and Drug Administration committee on Thursday voted unanimously to back a proposal to harmonise the current generation of Covid jabs to target the BA4 and BA5 Omicron sub-variants, as well as the original strain of the virus.

“Simpler is better. Closer is better,” said Dr Ofer Levy, a member of the advisory committee.

There are currently several different vaccine regimens and schedules in the US for different patient groups, even though vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna dominate the market.

The FDA does not always follow the vote of its advisory committee but on most occasions it does. The change, if implemented, would mark part of a wider shake-up of the US Covid vaccination programme, which has suffered lower public uptake than many other developed nations.

Advisers discussed an FDA proposal to move to an annual strategy with a single shot delivered in the autumn to most individuals, in a similar manner to influenza vaccines. Young children, older people and immunocompromised individuals would receive two shots.

Under this plan health officials would meet every year in June to decide which strains of Covid to target with a new vaccine. Companies would then produce vaccines to match these requests.