New data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has revealed that unvaccinated adults infected with Covid-19 who are 65 and older are 49 times more likely to need hospitalization compared to those who have received booster doses.

The CDC also found that in December, unvaccinated adults in that same age group experienced a rate of Covid-related hospitalization 17 times higher than those who are fully vaccinated.

For unvaccinated adults between 50 and 64, they are 44 times more likely to require hospitalization compared with those who are immunized.

In that same age group, unvaccinated adults were also 17 times more likely to experience Covid-related hospitalization.

According to the CDC, adults who are 65 and older and have received both doses of either the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine showed a 94% reduced risk of Covid-related hospitalizations.

Unvaccinated adults aged 18 to 49 are 12 times more likely to be hospitalized, whereas unvaccinated adolescents who are 12 to 17 are nine times more likely to be hospitalized compared with their fully immunized counterparts.

“Getting very sick means that older adults with Covid-19 might need hospitalization, intensive care, or a ventilator to help them breathe, or they might even die. The risk increases for people in their 50s and increases in 60s, 70s, and 80s. People 85 and older are the most likely to get very sick,” the CDC said on its website.

“Get vaccinated as soon as possible,” the agency added.

Last Friday, international regulators at the International Coalition of Medicines Regulatory Authorities published a report that reaffirmed the importance of obtaining a booster dose.

“Reviewing data on the impact of Omicron, the participants concluded that current vaccines offer less protection against infection and mild disease caused by this variant. However, vaccination continues to offer considerable protection from hospitalisation and severe Covid-19 with Omicron, especially after a booster dose,” the regulators said.

“It is becoming increasingly clear that a booster dose is needed to extend vaccine protection,” they added.

Nevertheless, the regulators also acknowledged that “the administration of multiple booster doses at short intervals is not a sustainable approach in the longer term,” adding: “There is a need to develop a long-term strategy on the types of vaccines needed to manage Covid in the future.”

According to Johns Hopkins data, the US has recorded more than 69m cases as well as over 860,000 deaths since the pandemic began. Approximately 63% of Americans have been fully vaccinated.

Earlier this week, the US’s top medical adviser Anthony Fauci said that there were five stages of the pandemic and that the world is still currently in the first phase, “where the whole world is really very negatively impacted as we are right now”.

The following four phases are deceleration, control, elimination and eradication. “If you look at the history of infectious diseases, we’ve only eradicated one infectious disease in man, and that’s smallpox. That’s not going to happen with this virus,” Fauci said in reference to Covid-19.