Hundreds of thousands of children in the United States may be eligible for the covid-19 vaccination by the end of next week. When the FDA meets today, they may discuss vaccination for children aged five to eleven, and vaccine experts have already declared that the benefits exceed the risks. An FDA advisory council may want to give the covid vaccination for younger children the green light as soon as possible.
Dr. Anne Zomick, a local pediatrician from AHN Saint Vincent, explains what this could mean: “With a little luck, we’ll be able to have much less contamination and the kids will be in school more, we won’t have quarantine, the kids will probably be exposed to someone else at faculty, so that needs to clearly help a lot.”
Approximately 28 million children could be eligible if the CDC eventually approves the two-shot, lower-dose vaccination. “Two Pfizer dosages, three weeks apart, and it’ll still take more than one week after that to get precise antibody response,” Dr. Zomick explains. “The sooner we get it functioning, the sooner we’ll be able to provide safety for the kids as well.” Those images could be in the hands of five to eleven-year-olds as early as next week.
“A large population of people who haven’t been vaccinated,” adds Dr. Zomick. “Of course, a lot of their parents were vaccinated, so maybe those kids will be vaccinated as well, and that will be a fantastic method for us to distinguish ourselves within the herd immunity.” But, in the end, it is up to the parents to decide whether or not to have their children vaccinated, as Pfizer claims they are already packed, prepared, and ready to ship out their vaccine for children.
“It works both ways; lots of people have concerns and questions, but once you can answer their questions and figure out precisely what it is that concerns them about it, that frequently helps,” Dr. Zomick says of whether or not her patients’ parents get them vaccinated. “However, the majority of people are ecstatic and eager. The father and mother were both vaccinated, and they can’t wait for their children to get vaccinated, and they feel like they’re doing a fantastic job protecting their children.”
If both the FDA and the CDC approve the two-dose shot for emergency use, children in that age group might start getting the vaccine as early as November 4.
FDA Set To Meet Today About Vaccine For Kids 5 To 11 – Erie News Now | WICU And WSEE In Erie, PA. (2001, July 1). FDA Set to Meet Today About Vaccine For Kids 5 to 11 – Erie News Now | WICU and WSEE in Erie, PA.
