2.6 Million Children Have Received Covid Vaccine In 1st Two Weeks

The vaccine uptake for children is off to a faster start than did the adult roll-out almost 10 months ago. JL

Andrew Jeong and Annabelle Timsit report in the Washington Post:

Nearly 10% of 5- to 11-year-olds in the United States have received their first coronavirus vaccine dose, just two weeks into the immunization campaign for the 28 million young Americans in that age group. "The pace of vaccinations for kids has been accelerating. In the last week, 1.7 million kids got vaccinated — double the prior week.” The CDC signed off on a pediatric vaccine for younger children Nov. 2, and the nationwide drive to inoculate that age group was operational Nov. 8.

Nearly 10 percent of 5- to 11-year-olds in the United States have received their first coronavirus vaccine dose, just two weeks into the immunization campaign for the 28 million young Americans in that age group, Jeff Zients, the White House’s coronavirus coordinator, said Wednesday.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention signed off on a pediatric vaccine for younger children Nov. 2, and the nationwide drive to inoculate that age group was operational Nov. 8.

Zients, speaking to reporters alongside the nation’s top infectious-disease expert, Anthony S. Fauci, and CDC Director Rochelle Walensky, estimated that by the end of the day Wednesday, 2.6 million children younger than 12 would have received their first shot.

“In fact, the pace of vaccinations for kids has been accelerating. In the last week, 1.7 million kids got vaccinated — double the prior week,” Zients said.

The positive developments that the White House sought to highlight coincided with grimmer news. New cases, hospitalizations and deaths are increasing in some colder states, although covid-19 fatalities are declining in the nation as a whole, Washington Post figures show. More than 763,000 Americans have died of covid-19 since the start of the pandemic.