Ever since federal officials briefly halted Johnson & Johnson's COVID-19 vaccine rollout this spring, the shot has seen limited use in the U.S. Now, the program is hitting another major setback.
Citing new data on the risk of potentially deadly blood clots associated with the J&J shot, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) vaccine advisers have recommended use of mRNA shots from Pfizer and Moderna over J&J's vaccine, The Washington Post reports.
At a meeting Thursday, members of the CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) reviewed data showing that nine deaths—in people ages 28 to 62—have been linked to the J&J shot through September. Among the deaths, seven were women and two were men, the Post reports.
The recommendation applies to initial vaccination and for booster use, the Post reports. Like other ACIP recommendations, the decision now heads to CDC Director Rochelle Walensky, M.D., for a final signoff.
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The recommendation follows a tough stretch for J&J's shot since its emergency use authorization. It hit the scene in the spring with great fanfare as the first one-and-done pandemic vaccine, but, shortly into the rollout, officials flagged a risk of rare blood clots. They paused the rollout to investigate and cleared it once again 10 days later.
The vaccine never really recovered in the U.S. About 17 million doses have been administered, the CDC says, far shy of the 284 million doses for the Pfizer-BioNTech shot and 186 million for the Moderna vaccine.
Meanwhile, Pfizer and Moderna are reaping monumental sales from their COVID-19 shots. During the first nine months of 2021, Pfizer reported more than $24 billion in sales for its BioNTech-partnered Comirnaty, while Moderna's Spikevax pulled in $10.7 billion during that time. J&J's COVID-19 vaccine, by comparison, generated $766 million during the first nine months of 2021, the company said.