Albertans 18+ can book bivalent COVID-19 vaccine appointments next week

The new bivalent COVID-19 vaccine will be available in Alberta starting next week, the province announced Wednesday afternoon.

Albertans 18 and older can make appointments for the Moderna Spikevax booster starting Wednesday, Sept. 21.

Appointments will be available that day, the province said.

The bivalent vaccine protects against the Omicron BA.1 variant and the original COVID-19 strain.

People who received a series of shots and are at least five months from their last dose, booster, or most recent infection are eligible.

The new vaccine vaccine is expected to be available for Albertans aged 12 to 17 in late September or early October.

The shots will be accessible at participating pharmacies and some Alberta Health Services sites.

“It's really immunizing you against both strains, and what this will do is this will bring your immunity a little closer to the strains that are currently in the province," said Craig Jenne, an infectious disease expert from the University of Calgary. "Not a perfect match, because we are now dealing with variants of Omicron, but a much closer match to what's circulating here in the province.”

Alberta has administered more than nine million COVID-19 vaccine doses, with 82 per cent of eligible people receiving one shot, 77.6 per cent getting two, and 39.3 per cent having one booster.

With files from CTV News Edmonton's Saif Kaisar