COVID-19 VACCINATION AVAILABLE FOR CHILDREN 5 TO 11 YEARS OF AGE

November 3, 2021, 4:53 am 6.2k Views 47 Comments

Source: Santa Barbara County Public Health Department

On November 2, the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC) endorsed recommendations that children 5 to 11 years old be vaccinated against COVID-19 with the Pfizer-BioNTech pediatric vaccine. This announcement follows the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) authorization of the pediatric vaccine last week. The Western States Scientific Safety Review Workgroup has also approved these recommendations. With this authorization, approximately 42,000 children ages 5 through 11 are now eligible to be vaccinated in Santa Barbara County.

Children ages 5 through 11 years will receive one-third of the adult dose of Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine. Smaller needles, designed specifically for children, are used for this age group. COVID-19 vaccine dosage does not vary by patient weight but by age on the day of vaccination. Children will need a second shot of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine three weeks after their first shot.

According to the CDC, similar to what was seen in adult vaccine trials, vaccination was nearly 91 percent effective in preventing COVID-19 among children aged 5-11 years. In clinical trials, vaccine side effects were mild, self-limiting, and similar to those seen in adults and with other vaccines recommended for children. The most common side effect was a sore arm.

“Protecting our children has been a community priority throughout this pandemic. We are elated to now offer them the protection of a safe, effective COVID-19 vaccine,” shared Dr. Van Do-Reynoso, PhD, MPH, County Public Health Director. “With pediatric vaccines becoming available in our community, we highly encourage parents and caregivers to get their children fully vaccinated. As the holiday season continues, let’s do everything we can to ensure the safety of our kids.”

Local distribution of pediatric COVID-19 vaccines has already begun with full-scale availability anticipated the week of November 8. Vaccines will be available at pediatric healthcare provider offices, pharmacies, and through targeted community events at schools and other venues.

For information about the pediatric COVID-19 vaccine and countywide availability, please visit www.publichealthsbc.org/vaccine/ or call 2-1-1. 

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  4. Sac – That represents the system working! Your pediatrician sees the special need of your daughter and is advising you to get it for her. In the absence of that special need though, I don’t see how it makes sense at this point for most other kids 5-11. That certainly may change as the data sample quickly goes from the 3-4k Pfizer test cases to over a million in the next few weeks…but at this point it doesn’t seem to make sense to give it to 5-11 year old’s that don’t have special conditions.

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  5. You still don’t get it and many have had it backwards this entire pandemic. It is not the child’s responsibility to protect the adults, it is the adults responsibility to protect themselves. If you want to vaccinate your kid to protect the at risk people they’re around in your family, great, go for it! That is your choice as a parent. But to MANDATE this for all children, when children have nominal benefit from the protection it provides and the mandated vaccination benefiting at-risk adults instead, it is an absolutely unconscionable position almost on the same level of closing schools (and the significant negative consequences it had on kids) to protect the adults.

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  9. Vaccinated and unvaccinated people (and kids) are spreading it…and as per latest research, in fairly equal measure. As such, what’s the value or point in giving it to healthy kids? There is a point and value to letting pediatricians suggest it for kids that are at risk, but at this point with what we know, there is no tangible purpose, point or value in giving it to ALL 5-11 year olds.

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  10. Those viruses/diseases are significantly more dangerous to children than covid, the associated vaccines were studied for many years before they were ever mandated, they’re much more effective at stopping infection/transmission, and booster shots (if any) are needed years later, not months. So no, I feel very differently about polio, MMR, chicken pox etc, than coivd vaccine; my entire family already has those vaccines (and the adults our covid shots). If the covid vaccines were able to stop covid in it’s tracks, my view might change, but then if they were able to d that we wouldn’t need to mandate it either.

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  12. @2:44 you’re exactly the problem, acting like you know better for Dukes kids than his actual parents and pediatrician. It’s people like you making these proclamations and demanding everyone fail in line with your line of thinking without question or else …

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  14. At this point, blindly advocating for a shot for all kids (including perfectly healthy kids) in which the primary purpose is to limit spread when research is showing it doesn’t really accomplish that (and doesn’t do anything for the kids) is pretty questionable. It’s a nice tool to have for kids that have issues and needs….

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  18. https://www.thelancet.com/journals/laninf/article/PIIS1473-3099(21)00648-4/fulltext
    Here’s the Lancet. Again, if you are a certain age and/or are immunocomprised then you need the vaccine. But that’s a much different situation/question than should all 5 year olds get it. If vaccinated and unvaccinated people can spread it in equal measure, what’s the value in giving it to 5 year olds?

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  19. Anti-vaxxers truly are driven by ignorance and blind politics…but so is the other side. Like most things in life, the truth is somewhere in the middle. It’s a miracle vaccine that has saved many lives and should be quickly gotten by huge swathes of the population…it just so happens that at this point ALL 5-11 year olds aren’t part of that group. That can (and perhaps will!) change with more data…we’re at 4000 kids tested…will be invaluable to see more data as it comes…

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  20. SBTownie, I think more are opposed to it being mandated (that ignores natural immunity), particularly one that is so new and not as effective as originally touted in addition to valid concerns about shadyness of Big Pharma being in bed with the bureaucrats at the FDA, the FDA that gave us the “not addictive” OxyContin opioid epidemic and Pfizer, the largest fraud settlement in history https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-announces-largest-health-care-fraud-settlement-its-history

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  21. @2:57, absolutely not, I’m advocating for people to make their own decisions based on what is best for them and you want to force decision upon them based on what you think is best for them. Huge difference that I’m sure you see, you’re just being a…

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  22. DUKE – eh… not so sure the research doesn’t show it helps limit the spread. Are you sure about that? Sure, it’s not a cure or 100% effective, but it is proven to lower the risk of infection and spread. If it did nothing to lower the risk, why would the CDC and most docs be encouraging it?

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  26. DUKE – from your Lancet article: “Vaccination reduces the risk of delta variant infection and accelerates viral clearance.” Sure, there’s a “nonetheless” regarding spread in households being similar, but the point is, “Vaccination reduces the risk of delta variant infection and accelerates viral clearance.” So, instead of just throwing our hands up and saying “it’s not good enough,” let’s take what we can get to combat this.
    Reminds me of when you all were saying masks aren’t 100% effective, so let’s not require them. We have to rise above that fatalistic thinking. If we have ANY tools to decrease the risk of infection, they should be used. We’re not going to get anywhere if we keep “hemming and hawing.”

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  27. Sac – your right… you and I should be vaccinated… but where in that article are you seeing the justification for 5 year olds to get it? If they can spread it vaccinated or not at similar levels (and are virtually untouched by Covid) wherein lies the value?
    We should be much more worried about the waning efficacy of the vaccine… as I don’t know about you, but I’m 6 months out from shot #2 … Which means Im virtually unvaccinated…

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  28. It’s seems like we need to focus on what actually will help. Shipping 60 million doses to Africa would help more than giving 60 million doses to 5-11 year olds here. You are constantly desperate to do something… which is natural and often good… but it doesn’t bear out logically.

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  29. We aren’t talking about masks though… we’re talking about vaccinating… and as we’re seeing with the waning immunity, are we doing this every 4-6 months for everyone… whether they are 5 or 85…? Might there need to be a thought on what makes sense?

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  30. I did a little research on this topic and found that the hospitalization rate of children with COVID is very, very low. Here is a good article from CDC. https://www.fda.gov/media/153508/download Basically, for children and adolescents aged 0-17 it’s 49 per 100,000.
    Another article from FDA (https://www.fda.gov/media/153508/download) shows that pre-COVID and in the early stages of the spread of COVID, hospitalizations for children due to the common flu were much higher than current numbers of COVID hospitalizations of children. It’s interesting that hospitalizations from the flu dropped to nearly nothing as COVID spread, but studies show this is a common occurrence during a pandemic, such as the NIHI outbreak in 2009.
    Based on the science and coupled with the facts that many children have already been exposed to COVID and the risk to children is lower than the common flu that we deal with every year, there really is no logical, science or data-based reason to have a young child vaccinated. The bottom line is, I and my doctor decide what goes into my body and my dependent’s bodies, not the government or teachers unions!

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  32. I’d say people who trust the government agencies and the media are the willfully ignorant ones. And the only ones spouting hate and divisiveness, Why are you not fully protected by your vaaccine? You are refusing to ask yourself that question.

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  35. BR3220 – why do you rely on the government for your healthcare decisions? We asked our pediatrician, and also asked another pediatrician we’re friends with and both said, without hesitation, to get the vaccine. I don’t take my medical advice from Newsom, Biden or even Trump. I listen to my doctor and the other medical experts at the FDA and CDC. Stop going to your politicians for healthcare advise, they have no idea what they’re talking about.

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  37. Recent data shows that the unvaccinated are 6x more likely to be positive for COVID than the vaccinated.
    It’s not really about whether or not my elementary aged kid is at a great risk for getting sick form COVID. The whole reason for getting him vaccinated is because we will be visiting elderly immune compromised grandparents over the holidays.
    I don’t understand why you people STILL don’t GET this.
    What does my pediatrician recommend? Well, his kids are all vaccinated (except for the youngest, who will be soon, I’m sure).

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  40. But the viral load of vaccinated vs unvaccinated is the same… so it doesn’t matter (to the grandparents) whether the kids are vaccinated or not. What matters is if the grandparents are vaccinated…
    Thank you though for adding to the data though… that is important and helpful for us all…

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  41. People seem to be missing the point. The point is not just to protect children from COVID. They are at low risk of serious complications. The point is to attempt to prevent them transmitting it to others and being vectors for disease. This is why we vaccinate for many diseases that do not kill most people.
    That said, the dream of herd immunity is clearly over. I was thrilled to get vaccinated in February and we all enjoyed that brief window in June and July when it really seemed like COVID was going to be behind us. The vaccines, especially J&J and Pfizer, have proven less than stellar although they are still VERY GOOD at preventing death and serious complications and thus we should continue to get them. I got Moderna and will continue to get Moderna as it is a best in class performer. But it is clear the vaccines are not the panacea we had hoped for. And this sucks. As immunity and resistance to COVID seems to vary greatly from person to person and from vaccine to vaccine, it seems like it is going to be harder than ever (and frankly, near futile) to mandata vaccines unless we are also forcing monthly antibody testing on people and then requiring them to get re-dosed as soon as protection wanes. That is obviously impossible to administer and authoritarian and it’s not going to happen.
    I see a big tragedy in all of this as that rapid tests are still expensive and hard to come by. I am less concerned with them not being 100% reliable. In a better world, every citizen or household would receive a complimentary pack of rapid test strips each week or month and would use them responsibly. To me, this seems like this would also be more readily accepted by the anti-vax and anti-mask crowd and it could be promoted as a simple part of one’s hygiene routine, work routine, or as a courtesy before socializing. But we know this will never happen, so why am I even talking about it.

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  42. BR32220
    Friend, no one has ever said that the vaccines provide 100% protection. You know that. It has been stated again and again and again. Why do you not understand this simple fact at this point? You are refusing to ask yourself this question.

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  43. BOOMER – “The bottom line is, I and my doctor decide what goes into my body” – what does your doc say about it? I work with a lot of doctors in this town and have yet to speak to one who advised against the vaccine. Are you really listening to your doctor? YouTube docs don’t count.

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  44. BR3220, yeah, that’s false. And even if it were true, it’s the last thing you should worry about. The body is temporary, the soul is forever. Aren’t you far more worried about the use of LUCIFERASE as a Satanic tracking marker which is included in the vaccine cocktail? Don’t you want to save the immortal souls of all the people who are being delivered unto Satan by the Godless Socialist fake Doctors?
    LOL!

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  45. Parents gladly gave their kids chicken pox vaccine when it came out – and only under 50 children died from it. Around 800 kids have died of Covid. So essentially you are saying it’s ok to spread the virus to older people who it can easily kill. You are also saying kids shouldn’t take the chickenpox vaccine – and allow it to spread like wildfire – and cause hundreds of thousands of parents to take a week off with their kid instead of working. Stopping the transmission of Covid will also help other variants from emerging. I think I agree with Johns Hopkins university and hundreds of thousands of other medical experts before I’d agree with Boomer.

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