Children as young as the age of five will be getting vaccinated against the adverse side effects of the COVID-19 virus all across the United States till then next week.
But would it be that easy to happen? Parents are still in the conundrum of getting shots by their young children. Others are optimistic, eagerly waiting for the vaccine to protect their children from any other variant.
Seemingly, the Federal Government is not in a position to take the decision in a rush. Potential measures have to be taken before the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine gets inside children’s arms.
According to the previous attempts, Pfizer is leading the vaccine production from the front. Moderna has also been showing some promising results recently with a similar age group. On the other hand, Johnson & Johnson is all set to begin its trials on young children in the coming days as well.
An assistant professor at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Larry Kociolek says:
“The longer we go without getting vaccine rates upward to 80-90% of individuals in this country, the longer it’s going to take to get COVID-19 transmission under control in our communities,”
According to the FDA, it is poised to allow the emergency authorization of a significantly lower dose of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine in children of 5-11 y/o.
The FDA advisory committee surprisingly supported the use of vaccine shots in young children. These are the same shots that Pfizer found the most effective vaccine for these groups of children.
Moreover, the FDA can issue a positive decision against COVID-19 vaccine shots for children next week before the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention committee brings down the issue next week.
FDA should also take into account that authorization may not be enough to convince parents who are not willing for their children to get COVID vaccinations.
Anthony Fauci – Infectious Disease Expert made a statement in an interview that:
“If we can get the overwhelming majority of those 28 million children vaccinated, I think that would play a major role in diminishing the spread of infection in the community,” With the authorization, it is expected that 28 million American children from 5-11 years of age will get vaccinated by the end of 2021.
