A new COVID vaccine is due out next month, but health experts and analysts say it is likely to be coolly received even as hospitalizations from "Eris", a variant of the Omicron form of the coronavirus, rise around the country.

Some public health experts hope that Americans will welcome the new shot as they would a flu jab. But demand for the vaccine has dropped sharply since 2021 when it first became available and more than 240 million people in the U.S., or 73% of the population, received at least one shot.

In the fall of 2022, by which time most people had either had the COVID virus or the vaccine, fewer than 50 million people got the shots.

  • deo@beehaw.org
    24·
    1 year ago

    Is anyone else super annoyed by the use of the word “jab” in news articles/headlines? It just sounds so unprofessional.

    • JCPhoenix@beehaw.org
      17·
      1 year ago

      Isn’t “jab” what people from the UK call it? In the US, we just call them “shots.” That’s not necessarily any better. Or worse, for that matter.

      • deo@beehaw.org
        8·
        1 year ago

        I’ve seen US publications use it, too. But knowing it’s a UK thing makes me feel better about it for some reason…

    • StringTheory@beehaw.org
      5·
      1 year ago

      “Jab” got adopted in the US when the disinformation memes and stuff started flooding into social media. The creators of the memes learned British English, so they used British slang.