Until today (Aug 23), the COVID vaccine only benefitted from emergency use authorization. But now, the U.S. FDA has given full approval to the Pfizer-BioNTech’s COVID-19 vaccine.

The vaccine now carries the strongest endorsement from the Food and Drug Administration, which has never before had so much evidence to judge a shot’s safety.

More than 200 million Pfizer doses already have been administered in the U.S. — and hundreds of millions more worldwide — since emergency use began in December.

The U.S. becomes the first country to fully approve the shot. Having the FDA approval should give added confidence that this vaccine is safe and effective, and maybe many people who were vaccine-hesitant, will now have the assurance that the vaccine is safe to take.

Vaccine mandates are coming

Now that the vaccine has been granted full approval, I think we’ll see many other businesses and organizations start to mandate vaccinations.

This month, New York City, New Orleans, and San Francisco all imposed proof-of-vaccination requirements at restaurants, bars, and other indoor venues. At the federal level, President Biden is requiring government workers to sign forms attesting that they’ve been vaccinated or else submit to regular testing and other requirements.

Nearly six in 10 Americans favor requiring people to be fully vaccinated to travel on airplanes or attend crowded public events, according to a recent poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.