Covid Vaccines, Schools, and Kids
When Pfizer’s COVID vaccine became available to 12-15 year olds a few weeks ago, public school parents in Fairfax County received multiple emails and texts advocating for children to get vaccinated. Fairfax County Health Director Dr. Gloria Addo-Ayensu and FCPS Superintendent Scott Braband issued a joint statement encouraging “everyone 12 years of age and older to get the COVID-19 vaccine as soon as possible.” To expedite those vaccinations, FCPS has been scheduling free vaccination clinics the last few weeks at schools across the county for students 12 and up and is offering free transportation to and from the clinics for students at other schools. The school district assures parents that the American Academy of Family Physicians and the American Academy of Pediatrics support the vaccine’s use for 12 to 15 year olds and that the “vaccine has been studied and shown to be safe and effective in this age group.”
This whole campaign has the effect of a steamrolling job, designed to twist parents’ arms into agreeing to subject their children to a vaccine that may be safe and effective, but certainly isn’t necessary. Consider that, as of June 2, only 309 children (from 0-17) have died from causes “involving” COVID, a qualification that allows for the likelihood that pre-existing conditions or other factors were involved in at least some of these deaths. Over that same period, 751 children died from pneumonia out of a total of 45,513 child deaths. As for concerns about adults these children may come in contact with, almost every adult at this point has had the opportunity to get vaccinated.
Then there are valid questions about COVID vaccines’ long-term safety. They are all still only authorized by the FDA on an emergency use basis. Vaccines can often take 10-15 years of development before being approved. We simply cannot know the long-term effects of COVID vaccines until we have had a long term to study them.
Those who have underlying health issues or are at greater risk of suffering severe illness or death are rightly weighing the risks of the known effects of the virus versus the unknown long-term effects of the vaccine and making the decision that’s best for them. For most children, though, the risks of contracting serious illness from the virus, let alone dying, are minimal. When weighed against the unknown long-term effects of the vaccine, the arguments for pushing COVID vaccines on minors don’t add up. Maybe our public schools need to focus more on logic and probability studies than social engineering.
