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?

We have been talking since March 2020 about protecting the vulnerable. The most vulnerable in our society are the children. We have a duty as adults to get the bad if you can/want it is not right as society to push that into children. Children have lost the most during this pandemic and still people want them to risk more and more, when will it end.

Yes absolutely.

We are behind other countries in this, and thr wider health benefits are huge if we want schools to remain open, protect the vulnerable etc.

Children as superspreaders!

Absolutely yes, and I really wish we would catch up with US and now many EU countries on this.

For those of you saying you won't be because of covid only having a mild effect on most children, my concern is that leaving children unvaccinated gives the virus more opportunity to mutate into a strain which is more severe in children, given that this will be main infection pool once the majority if the rest of the population are vaccinated.

Yes, definitely. DS2 is eager to have it too - he hates being ill!

Yes absolutely

Absolutely DD was 12 the week after they vaccinated in her school and asked to go to the first walk in we could after that. DS is 7 and asking when he can have his.

@MrsHerculePoirot why his a 7 year old asking for a covid jab? Is he that worried? I find that quite sad I'm afraid.

I will absolutely get my kids jabbed as soon as it's available to us.

I don't agree with it but I'll probably say yes, just because I've never turned down a vaccine. I don't think it's justified though.

I've no safety concerns about it, just ethical ones.

[quote Remmy123]@MrsHerculePoirot why his a 7 year old asking for a covid jab? Is he that worried? I find that quite sad I'm afraid.[/quote]
🤣🤣🤣 it’s ok you can keep you faux sympathy thanks - he’s perfectly fine. He just has a sense of wanting to ‘do his bit’ and like the vast majority of people we know feels it is the right thing to do and will listen to the scientists/experts.

Luckily he’s not one of the ‘enough is enough’ brigade…. I’d feel much more concerned for him then…

@Waxonwaxoff0

You get it in a nutshell when you say that your child isn't responsible for the community's health.

I'd add that we aren't in our role as parents responsible for the community's health either. Our only responsibility is to our own children -- taking care of them until they can take care of themselves. The risk here is pretty small, but I believe it's unethical to act against a child's self-interest by forcing an act of altruism.

A simpler example: I would like to think I would jump in a freezing and fast-flowing river to save someone, despite the risk of drowning. But I wouldn't want to be pushed in by someone insisting I make the right choice.

DS 12 had his in October.
My 10yr old will have theirs as soon as it's allowed.

I can’t see how you can substantiate your statement as there’s no proof either way atm. A fresh vaccine dose, of any vaccine I believe, even your first dose, would trigger an immune response in your body that would lower your chances of catching it and consequentially spreading it. Any improvement compared to the disaster situation that we have now would be worth taking, imo. If there had given them the vaccine NOW (as other eu countries are doing) come January the schools would see less cases, both in kids and in staff.

I don’t understand the messaging of the government to be honest, they’re getting it wrong and putting off from having the first dose all the people who were still hesitant. It’s not like 2 doses don’t work. It’s that 2 doses already 6 months old (and perhaps given too far apart, by political choice) don’t offer protection to Omicron. But even starting now your immunisation programme would be incredibly useful!

leaving children unvaccinated gives the virus more opportunity to mutate into a strain which is more severe in children

Probably not. The suspicion is that Om evolved in a host that was immunologically compromised. And although that’s possible of children, like with others, it’s generally the case that children’s systems are well able to deal with the virus. Otherwise we’d have seen a huge difference in the rate of hospitalised children.

That was in response to:

RandomKettle500

user1477249785

I live somewhere where it is already available. Both of my kids have had it. Aside from avoiding long covid and reducing it spreading generally through society, for me one of the main upsides is that it means it's much less likely schools close.

Why does it make schools less likely to close? It barely lowers transmission and school closures seem to be based on numbers of cases which continue to be high among vaccinated people.

...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.

Your numbers make flu sound like a very rare occurrence @RandomKettle500, but that's not the case at all. In the US, for example, between 5 - 20% of the population get flu every year - these percentages will be higher if you look at the population of children only. Under 5's, and especially under 2's, are at higher risk of complications too.

In addition, you're talking about randomised control trials only in your above example (though I suspect the numbers are made up for the purpose of your argument). Observational studies - ie observing how vaccines perform in the real-world - are also performed. How well vaccines work is very carefully monitored.

No I would not allow this for my children. I hope the jvci stand up to this. Unfortunately some of their doctors on the board have since resigned after being pressured by our government to change their recommendations. Finland have taken a sensible approach to this

www.reuters.com/world/europe/finland-limit-childrens-covid-19-vaccines-high-risk-households-2021-12-02/

Marynotsocontrary

Yes the numbers are made up to explain how “efficacy” is calculated. Some people think that 90% efficacy means 90% of people are protected and 10% aren’t but that isn’t what it means.

No, my DCs have had covid and they have had worse colds. I'm not risking side effects for them to protect other people.

@puppeteer

leaving children unvaccinated gives the virus more opportunity to mutate into a strain which is more severe in children

Probably not. The suspicion is that Om evolved in a host that was immunologically compromised. And although that’s possible of children, like with others, it’s generally the case that children’s systems are well able to deal with the virus. Otherwise we’d have seen a huge difference in the rate of hospitalised children.

In any case the virus will mutate in countries where vaccination is low. It's not going to make any difference if a few rich countries decide to vaccinate children. There's 7.5 billion people on the planet for viruses to mutate among

@fluffyegg

No way is my child having that , not until it's finished it trial period at the very least and even then I wouldn't rush !

What is the trial period please?

Marynotsocontrary

A real life example of efficacy from a Pfizer COVID trial in kids. 2268 participants. 16 tested positive in the placebo group and 3 tested positive in the vaccinated group. This gave an efficacy of over 90%. In total only 19 out of 2268 children tested positive! It’s tiny tiny numbers on which to base efficacy, but that is how they get their figures.

www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/pfizerbiontech-covid-19-vaccine-shows-907-efficacy-trial-children-2021-10-22/

Yes, for the sake of society. They both currently have covid and are totally fine. But have had to take one to hospital this year and I'm having cancer treatment - so I would like normal medical treatment to continue for all our sakes.

No. And I speak as a parent of a child with a transplant who is on immune-suppression meds.

From the start of the pandemic her doctors have said she’s no more at risk from Covid than any other child. They’ve studied all the data from the UK and around the world and they maintain this. She’s also in an ongoing study by Southampton University looking at the effects of Covid on immune compromised children. Every 6 months they publish their findings and each time it consistently says they are not affected and are at no more risk than any other child. This correlates with what her consultants say.

So in view of these expert opinions and studies we wouldn’t vaccinate any of our children against Covid now. In the future who knows.

And for the record she’s vaccinated against everything else she can be and has the flu vaccine every year because her doctors advise her to. Flu can be fatal to some children.