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With fresh COVID-19 cases bubbling up <\/a>in some parts of the country, health officials are setting course for a fall vaccination campaign.<\/p>\n The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Thursday recommended new shots for all Americans this fall.<\/p>\n Officials acknowledged the need for shots is not as dire as it was only a few years ago. Most Americans have some degree of immunity\u00a0from being infected<\/a>, from past vaccinations or both. COVID-19 deaths and hospitalizations last month were at about their lowest point since the pandemic first hit the United States in 2020.<\/p>\n But immunity wanes, new coronavirus variants keep emerging and there are still hundreds of COVID-19-associated deaths and thousands of hospitalizations reported each week.<\/p>\n What\u2019s more, health officials have reported upticks this month in COVID-19-associated emergency room visits and hospitalizations, and a\u00a0pronounced increase<\/a>\u00a0in positive test results in the southwestern U.S.<\/p>\n It\u2019s not clear whether that\u2019s a sign of a coming summer wave \u2014 which has happened before \u2014 or just a blip, said Lauren Ancel Meyers of the University of Texas, who leads a research team that tracks COVID-19<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ll have to see what happens in the coming weeks,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Earlier this month, the Food and Drug Administration \u2014 following the\u00a0guidance<\/a>\u00a0of its own panel of expert advisers \u2014 told vaccine manufacturers to target the JN.1 version of the virus. But a week later, the FDA told manufacturers that if they could still switch, a better target might be an offshoot subtype called KP.2.<\/p>\n At a Thursday meeting at the CDC in Atlanta, infectious disease experts unanimously recommended the updated vaccines for Americans age 6 months and older. The CDC director signed off on the recommendation later in the day. The shots are expected to become available in August and September.<\/p>\n Health officials have told Americans to expect a yearly update to COVID-19 vaccines, just like they are recommended to get a new shot each fall to protect against the latest flu strains.<\/p>\n But many Americans aren\u2019t heeding the CDC\u2019s advice.<\/p>\n As of last month, less than one-quarter of U.S. adults and 14% of children were up to date in their COVID shots. Surveys show shrinking percentages of Americans think COVID-19 is a major health threat to the U.S. population, and indicate that fewer doctors are urging patients to get updated vaccines.<\/p>\n CDC officials on Thursday presented recent survey information in which about 23% of respondents said they would definitely get an updated COVID-19 shot this fall, but 33% said they definitely would not.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, the CDC\u2019s Bridge Access Program \u2014 which has been paying for shots for uninsured U.S. adults \u2014 is expected to shut down in August because of discontinued funding. The program paid for nearly 1.5 million doses from September to last month.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is a challenge with this program going away,\u201d said the CDC\u2019s Shannon Stokley.<\/p>\n About 1.2 million U.S. COVID-associated deaths have been reported since early 2020, according to the CDC. The toll was most intense in the winter of 2020-2021, when weekly deaths surpassed 20,000. About 1 out of every 100 Americans ages 75 and older were hospitalized with COVID in the last four years, CDC officials said Thursday.<\/p>\n More on COVID-19:<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\nSubscribe to the Fortune Next to Lead newsletter to get weekly strategies on how to make it to the corner office. Sign up for free<\/a>.<\/div>\n