When they say that 5-11 year olds can have the vaccine.. will your 5-11 year old be having it?

[Dayrider]

They have put this through in USA so guessing it will come soon here.
I would have it for my DD but my husband doesn’t want her to.
What are you going to do?

Yes I will she is 10 and going to high school in September so makes sense to get it done before that.

Yes. She’s vulnerable and many family members help with childcare, all vulnerable too

@Totallydefeated

Oh, make no mistake, it won’t be long at all until this is approved for that age group and the pressure will start.

Absolutely no way will DD6 be having it.

I am really queasy about a society that prioritises the health of older people over that of children. In my book, adults should protect children, not the other way around.

I don’t think it’s ethical to expect kids, whose risk from Covid is vanishingly tiny, to take on the (admittedly statistically small) risk of a vaccine so that others may be protected, when it’s of hardly any benefit to them themselves. That’s just wrong.

Another post I totally agree with. 👏👏👏

I don’t think it’s ethical to expect kids, whose risk from Covid is vanishingly tiny, to take on the (admittedly statistically small) risk of a vaccine so that others may be protected, when it’s of hardly any benefit to them themselves. That’s just wrong.

This is my view. Children have been at the bottom of the pile during the pandemic, I'm not giving them a vaccine against a virus that poses no risk to them.

No way. They've had covid recently and it was incredibly mild. There is absolutely no reason to risk possible vaccine side effects, however unlikely.

No. Not with the necessary frequency of boosters. They both have ASD so why put them through that 4 times in a year.

If it lasted longer maybe but it seems so fleeting it's not worth it

Absolutely fucking not.
WHO described children earlier as "contaminating" adults.
Despicable behaviour and language.

@bellamountain, There has been pushback from workers in NYC (even private employees need to be fully vaccinated now, not just city workers etc. as before). Regarding the kids, the uptake hasn’t been substantial, but it seems the people who don’t do it aren’t kicking up a stink. It’s all very disappointing.

I’m double-vaccinated and plan to get my booster January 4th, btw, so absolutely not opposed to vaccines for 18+.

All those saying no, I am curious, do you also deny them the flu vaccine given in school?

@BurntO

All those saying no, I am curious, do you also deny them the flu vaccine given in school?

The flu vaccine yes. We don’t have that one either.

They’ve had all their other vaccinations. I’m not an anti-vaxxer. Just cautious.

I’m not even saying they won’t end up having the Covid vaccination. Just not right now.

Yes I would imagine so. The risks associated with the vaccine are less than with the disease even in children. It will mean we will have less concerns about amount of time spent with their grandparents and that they are less likely to catch a potentially unpleasant bug & have to isolate and miss school/events they are looking forward to.

@BurntO

All those saying no, I am curious, do you also deny them the flu vaccine given in school?

She doesn’t have the flu vaccine either, though I don’t’ deny her’ it. I make a carefully considered risk analysis based on her individual circumstances, rather than a broad-brush population level one.

She has no risk factors that would put her at risk for flu. If she did, eg asthma, I would probably consent to her having it, as her risk profile would be different and it would make more sense for her to have it.

She’s had all other vaccinations. She had seizures (not febrile convulsions) after her BCG jab, so I’m now very cautious and am only up for treatment that will actually benefit her

@BurntO

I'm inclining towards no on the Covid vaccine, but the cost benefit analysis with flu is different. From the HSA: 'Flu can be an extremely unpleasant illness in children, with those under the age of 5 being more likely to be hospitalised due to flu than any other age group.' Something like measles is obviously different again-- very dangerous, very contagious, a highly effective and proven vaccine.

Some people might be anti-vaccine in principle but I don't know what it means to be pro-vaccine in general. It depends on the necessity, safety, and efficacy of the vaccine.

BurntO

All those saying no, I am curious, do you also deny them the flu vaccine given in school?

Deny them it? It has very poor efficacy year on year. My youngest dd has never had any vaccines and she has never had flu. Why would she need a vaccine that seems to batter children’s immune systems for the two weeks following administration leaving them prone to picking up every infection going around at the time....on top of being “anywhere between 40 and 60% effective” (which could simply mean that in a trial of 100,000 children, if 10 developed flu in the placebo group there would have been between 4 and 6 in the vaccinated group. That’s how they measure efficacy in trials. If there was a single case of flu in the placebo group and none in the vaccinated group they can claim 100% efficacy, even though 99.99% of the placebo group didn’t catch flu.

Yes, like RandomKettle the general lack of matching the flu vaccination effectively to the dominant strain also pays a part in my decision not to consent to it for DD. If it were of a high level of effectiveness, the trade off would be different. As it is, given the low level of protection it usually offers, that adds to swing the pendulum against her having it.

God yes. DS is nearly 11 anyway, but severely autistic and like someone said of their autistic child upthread, a bloody super-spreader on account of having no boundaries, impulse control or sense! Plus, if he got badly ill he'd have to be sedated to receive so much as a drip.

I would let them have it. But I do think it should be parental choice not mandatory.

My concerns are these… Covid can cause long Covid in some children and I hope vaccination would make this less likely or milder.

Also Covid keeps mutating. There’s a chance it could mutate to be serious to children and I’d rather my kids be up to date with the vaccine course if that happens so they can have the Max immunity. Just look at 12+ now with one jab… had they been vaccinated sooner like in other countries they’d be better protected against omicron with two pending three doses. It made me think I’d rather be prepared for future variants.

Also Covid itself has caused far more tachycardia and deaths in children then vaccines.

@RandomKettle500

BurntO

All those saying no, I am curious, do you also deny them the flu vaccine given in school?

Deny them it? It has very poor efficacy year on year. My youngest dd has never had any vaccines and she has never had flu. Why would she need a vaccine that seems to batter children’s immune systems for the two weeks following administration leaving them prone to picking up every infection going around at the time....on top of being “anywhere between 40 and 60% effective” (which could simply mean that in a trial of 100,000 children, if 10 developed flu in the placebo group there would have been between 4 and 6 in the vaccinated group. That’s how they measure efficacy in trials. If there was a single case of flu in the placebo group and none in the vaccinated group they can claim 100% efficacy, even though 99.99% of the placebo group didn’t catch flu.

What studies do you base these claims on? My children have never been hugely ill following flu jab. More before if anything. A temp and sniffle forget a day at best.

Also the flu vaccine is given to school s children to protect the vulnerable children and parents. Not just those who take it. Like most vaccines it’s a society thing.

I am in the US. My daughter is 11 and had her second jab last week.

Yes.

While long COVID in kids does mercifully appear to be rare based on the good quality studies done in the last few months, there are enough reports of adversely affected smell and taste, to make me feel that I want my kids jabbed. I think it would be horrible for a child to experience that symptom for, maybe, several months.

Plus, it will be helpful for travel, perhaps.

We all get the flu jab every year in my family.

Definitely yes for my 7 year old!

@Tahaniisfine

Also the flu vaccine is given to school s children to protect the vulnerable children and parents. Not just those who take it. Like most vaccines it’s a society thing.

Yes, exactly.

Children are expected to take the risk from the vaccine to give benefit to adults. I think that’s unethical and wrong. Adults should be the ones protecting the children, not the other way around.

What studies do you base these claims on? My children have never been hugely ill following flu jab. More before if anything. A temp and sniffle forget a day at best.

I don’t need studies to base my claims on. I’ve observed it in my children’s classes for the past 9 years. Every year. No matter which week the administer the nasal flu vaccine, the week or two after has a spike in absences due to a myriad of different ailments from scarlet fever, to chicken pox, hand foot and mouth, d&v .... not to mention large numbers of “flu-like illness”. One year they closed the school for a deep clean three weeks after the nasal flu vaccine because half of the teaching staff were off with flu-like illness and most of the kids had the same and/or d&v.

Kids have multiple series of the same vaccinations as babies - that’s not new.