Fauci says J&J shot should have been a double dose from the start after study found that protection fell to just 3% in six months Dr. Anthony Fauci has recommended that Americans who received the one-dose Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine get a booster shot as soon as possible His comments came just days after a FDA advisory committee unanimously voted to recommend booster shots for adult J&J recipients Fauci also confirmed reports that those who got the J&J jab could be better off by getting a booster shot of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines A recently released study found that the J&J shot's protection fell from 88% in March to just 3% in August In comparison, Moderna's vaccine effectiveness fell from 92% to 64% and Pfizer's vaccine protection dropped from 91% to 50% By Natasha Anderson For Dailymail.Com Published: 18:56 BST, 17 October 2021 | Updated: 18:58 BST, 17 October 2021 Viewcomments Dr. Anthony Fauci believes Johnson & Johnson should have made their COVID-19 vaccine a two-dose shot and encourages Americans to get a booster for the one-jab vaccine as soon as it becomes available. 'What the advisors to the FDA felt is that, given the data that they saw, very likely, this should have been a two dose vaccine to begin with,' Fauci said during a Sunday morning interview on This Week ABC. 'So the idea of making a recommendation that people who originally received J&J should receive a second dose — 18 or older with none of the restrictions about whether or not you're at a high risk or not at a high risk — is that everyone who received that first dose of J&J who are 18 and older should receive it.' His comments came just days after a Food and Drug Administration (FDA) advisory committee unanimously voted to recommend booster shots for adult J&J recipients. Fauci notes, however, that Americans who got the one-dose shot should 'feel good' about the FDA recommendation and should get the jab as soon as possible. Dr. Anthony Fauci has recommended that Americans who received the one-dose Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine get a booster shot as soon as possible He also confirmed that those who got the J&J jab could be better off by getting a booster shot of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines, which were proven to be more effective. 'That is true, the data you refer to, that if you boost people who have originally received J&J with either Moderna or Pfizer, the level of antibodies that you induce in them is much higher than if you boost them with the original J&J,' Fauci said. 'However, you're talking about laboratory data, which very often are reflective of what you would see clinically. But the data of boosting the J&J first dose with a J&J second dose is based on clinical data. So what's going to happen is that the FDA is going to look at all those data, look at the comparison and make a determination of what they will authorize.' The advisory committee, made up of an array of public health experts, announced on Friday that all adults who were vaccinated with the one-dose vaccine get a second shot at least two months after their first. One study, released Thursday but not peer-reviewed, tracked more than 620,000 military veterans who received the vaccine and found that protection fell from 88% in March to just 3% in August. In comparison, Moderna's vaccine effectiveness fell from 92% to 64% and Pfizer's vaccine protection dropped from 91% to 50%. Nearly 15 million Americans received the J&J vaccine, with nearly 91% of them having gotten the shot more than two months ago, according to the Center for Disease Control (CDC). His comments came just days after a Food and Drug Administration (FDA) advisory committee unanimously voted to recommend booster shots for adult J&J recipients COVID vaccine booster shots are being recommended even though cases of infections have been dropping after a summer surge caused by the Delta variant. Experts point to CDC data that shows unvaccinated adults are 11 times more likely to die of COVID than vaccinated adults. 'J&J is a very good vaccine. I also believe it's probably a two-shot vaccine,' Dr. Ashish Jha, dean of the Brown University School of Public Health told CNN. 'It's really urgent that people get that second shot pretty quickly. On Thursday, the FDA advisory committee recommended booster shots of Moderna to those over the age of 65 but the agency delayed its decision to authorize the COVID vaccine for teenagers and younger adults. The FDA will now consider the advisory committee's recommendations on the J&J and Moderna COVID booster shots to make an official decision. If the FDA accepts the recommendation, which it is expected to do, booster shots could be made available as soon as next week. The FDA previously authorized booster shots of the Pfizer COVID vaccine to those 65 years old and above or any adult who is considered 'high-risk' due to their living, work, or health conditions. Share or comment on this article: All rights reserved for this news site (dailymail) and under his responsibility