Ex-FDA scientist criticizes White House's booster announcement as premature and 'not helpful'

The FDA's independent panel of vaccine advisers will meet Friday to consider the ongoing booster shot discussion, as well vote on whether to advise approving boosters for people 16 and older, The New York Times reports. Recently, scientists, administration officials, and public health agencies have been at odds over who needs booster shots and when, despite a White House roll out beginning Sept. 20. The CDC will discuss the matter next week.

Ahead of the meetings, however, former FDA Chief Scientist Dr. Jesse Goodman shared his thoughts on the matter with CNN's New Day, noting that while he believes Biden's chief medical adviser Dr. Anthony Fauci — who has backed the fall booster rollout, given fears of waning vaccine immunity — to have "tremendous expertise," the White House's premature decision was "not helpful."

"What I do think was backwards and not helpful was that the White House made an announcement with a certain date before really all the data had come in," said Goodman, "before [the] FDA had a chance to review it, and before there was this public discussion that we're now going to have."

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"I think any number of decisions could be reasonable here," Goodman added, seeming to allude to the outcome of the agencies' meetings, "and it's just going to be really important to explain the evidence and the decisions to the American people."

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