Health authorities are preparing to approve the booster dose of the COVID-19 vaccine for children between the ages of 12 and 15, amid a rebound in hospitalizations of children that are mainly attributed to the lack of immunization of minors.
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA, in English) will authorize this Monday that young people between 12 and 15 years old receive the booster from Pfizer, according to The New York Times newspaper.
All those under 12 years of age or older can receive both doses of the vaccine, but so far only those 16 years of age or older can receive the booster dose, essential according to medical authorities to deal with the omicron variant.
About four million minors between the ages of 12 and 15 were vaccinated between May, when it was authorized, until July, according to the CNN chain, so they can now receive the Pfizer booster, which must be administered at least six months after the second dose of Pfizer or Moderna or the first of Johnson & Johnson.
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But, in addition, the FDA plans to reduce that period from six months to just five, both for children between 12 and 17 years of age and for the rest of the population of legal age.
It is also expected to authorize the booster dose for children aged 5 to 11 with immune deficiencies.
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Following the FDA's decision, an advisory committee from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) will meet in the middle of next week to comment on the matter, and then it will be the CDC that will issue the final opinion. .
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The FDA expected to announce its decision this Thursday, according to the quoted outlet, but agreed to wait until Monday because CDC Director Rochelle Walensky wanted to hear the recommendations of her agency's external advisory group before approving the changes, and the FDA did not. could meet until Wednesday.
The CDC also released two studies on Thursday that reinforce the need to vaccinate children: one of them concludes that the medical problems of children aged 5 to 11 who have received the Pfizer vaccine are extremely rare;
the other analyzed hundreds of hospitalizations of minors in six cities during the summer and concluded that almost half of the children who became seriously ill had not been fully vaccinated.
So far, more than eight million doses of Pfizer's vaccine have been administered to children between the ages of 5 and 11 in the United States, but parents' doubts about their safety have slowed this campaign, according to The New York Times. .
Children's hospitalizations are avoidable
Dr. Anthony Fauci, the country's leading infectious disease expert, assured this Thursday in an interview with the NewsNation chain that
hospitalizations of children are avoidable as long as their parents vaccinate them.
"Virtually all the children, not 100% but almost, who are seriously ill in our hospitals due to COVID-19
are children whose parents decided they did not want to vaccinate them
," Fauci said.
And he added:
"That is avoidable."
"If you look at the number of children who are going to the hospital right now and who have serious illnesses, it almost has to be said that it
is the responsibility of parents to protect their children,
" he added.
In the past four weeks, the average number of children hospitalized with COVID-19 soared 52% - growing from 1,270 on Nov. 29 to 1,933 this past Sunday, according to an analysis by NBC News based on data from the Department of Health.
The number of hospitalized children doubled in 10 states, in Washington DC and Puerto Rico.
In the same period, adult hospitalizations with COVID-19 increased 29%.
