GREENSBORO, N.C. — Pharmacies and clinics across the country are administering COVID booster shots.
The latest version is a new bivalent booster which protects against the original strain of the virus, as well as the BA-4 and BA-5 omicron variants.
Adler Pharmacy on Church Street in Greensboro has been able to keep up with the demand while still allowing walk-ins.
The owner says they started getting calls about the new booster, as soon as it was approved.
"For the past one or two weeks now, we’ve had them in and they’ve been coming in from everywhere to come and get their shots," said Clement Edhodaghe, owner of Adler Pharmacy.
In Reidsville, Carolina Apothecary on Scales Street has set aside one day each week to give COVID boosters.
They are only offering the shots on Fridays.
Pharmacist April Procita says this has allowed them to streamline the process and take care of the influx of patients, more efficiently.
"We have them starting at 9:30 and going on till 5:30 in the evening. We have a dedicated person doing it, they walk in, they are set, we have them fill out their stuff online so they’re able to come in, it’s a quick process," said Procita. "So it’s encouraging people to come out because a lot of people go somewhere and don’t want to wait, you want to get in, you want to get out."
Dr. Christopher Ohl with with Atrium Health Wake Forest Baptist says they are not seeing anywhere near the demand as previous rounds of this vaccination.
Dr. Ohl adds, if it has been more than a couple months since your last booster, you need to get the new one.
"Getting this one is much more likely to get you through the Fall respiratory season without being touched by COVID," said Dr. Ohl, "Whereas if you don't get this fall one and you got vaccinated several months ago or you got COVID last January, there's a pretty good chance you'll get this new BA-5 strain during January and February."
Dr. Ohl says nearly 95% of the current cases of COVID in our area are from the BA-5 variant.
He expects that to be the primary strain through early 2023.