FAUCI: ‘WHEN, NOT IF’ 

Anthony Fauci said Wednesday he thinks the definition of being fully vaccinated will eventually change to include a booster, especially as new evidence is emerging that a booster dose offers the best protection against the omicron variant.

“Right now, I don’t see that changing tomorrow or next week,” Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, said in an interview with CNN’s Kate Bolduan. But, he added, “my own personal opinion …. it’s going to be a matter of when, not if.”

Still, Fauci noted that the definition of what it means to be fully vaccinated is a matter of semantics. What matters is the emerging evidence that a booster dose offers more protection than the initial series.

“Certainly, when you want to talk about what optimal protection is, I don’t think anybody would argue that optimal protection is going to be with a third shot,” Fauci said.

Big picture debate: A debate has emerged around what it means to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19, as some state and local officials have been pushing to change the definition to include an additional dose.

But some infectious disease experts argue that antibodies are not the only way to measure a vaccine’s performance, and people with two doses of an mRNA vaccine are still likely protected against severe disease and hospitalization.