FDA Delays Approval of COVID vaccines for Kids Under 5 until June

Parents might have to wait until the summer before the federal government authorizes a COVID-19 vaccine for children. According to the Politico, the sources revealed it could be June before the FDA authorizes a COVID-19 vaccine for children under five years old. Politico added that delays are being attributed to regulators who want to promote two vaccines at the same time instead of pushing one out before the other.

Vaccine advocates are encouraging the administration to act sooner rather than later. Colorado Governor Jared Polis even wrote a lettercalling on the Biden administration to step up efforts to get authorization for vaccines for the country’s youngest population. “Hospitalization rates for children under 5 were the highest ever during the omicron surge. While children younger than 5 are less vulnerable to SARS-CoV-2 than adults, they can still experience severe and lasting outcomes,” Polis said in the letter.

“Delays and lack of urgency from the FDA and vaccine developers in authorizing a vaccine for children under 5 are concerning,” wrote Governor Polis, adding, “We need bold federal action and support to give the authorization of a lifesaving COVID-19 vaccine for our youngest children  the attention, urgency and action it deserves.”

Politico’s report comes as the federal government has eased coronavirus restrictions nationwide with the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) recently announcing it will no longer enforce the CDC’s mask mandate for travel after a federal judge in Florida struck down the federal health agency’s directive.

Although Florida Judge Kathryn Kimball Mizelle, who was appointed by former President Donald Trump, voided the mandate, arguing that the CDC overstepped its authority, President Joe Biden’s administration is still encouraging travelers and commuters to mask up, as The Hill reported.

People magazine reports that amid the delay in the FDA’s urgency to push out a COVID-19 vaccine for children under the age of five, the CDC released new findings showing the benefits of getting children vaccinated. Unvaccinated kids aged 5 to 11 years old were more than twice as likely to end up in the hospital with COVID-19 during the omicron surge than vaccinated kids, according to a new report from the CDC.

And since last November when Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine was approved for use in 5 to 11 year olds, the majority of hospitalizations — 9 in 10 — were in kids who were unvaccinated, the CDC reported.

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