Second COVID-19 dose needs to be within six weeks, same brand as first dose

AP File

Two doses of the Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines are necessary to confer adequate immunity, health officials said Friday.

The Missouri National Guard is administering the Pfizer vaccine Feb. 12. If a person takes a Pfizer vaccine first, the second dose must be Pfizer. The same applies to Moderna.

Butler County Emergency Management Director Robbie Myers quoted from the Journal of the American Medical Association, “The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends the second dose of the COVID-19 vaccine be given within three weeks of the first dose for the Pfizer vaccine and within four weeks for the Moderna vaccine.

“No more than six weeks should lapse between doses, although if the second dose is not given during these time frames, it can be given without the need to repeat the first dose. It is not recommended to give the second dose any earlier than stated above, but if a person needs to get the second dose earlier, giving the second dose up to four days ahead of schedule is allowed.”

Amanda Fitzwater with the Butler County Health Center said, if someone misses the Feb. 12 clinic, “The National Guard is definitely doing several. Today (Friday), Pemiscot County is doing a mass clinic. These mass clinics are all over Southeast Missouri, currently with the National Guard. So really, anywhere that they could go, because it depends on if they received Pfizer. So they have to go somewhere where it’s a Pfizer vaccine.”

Fitzwater said the local health department is giving vaccinations, but “we don’t have Pfizer, we just have Moderna, so we wouldn’t be able to do that.”

She also recommended talking to their local physicians, as well as other area facilities who are doing vaccinations.