Our children demand for us to make correct decisions for them; discussing the idea of vaccinations for children

BY SIMONE J. SMITH

“We do not yet know the effectiveness of a COVID-19 vaccine.” (Opel, Diekema, Ross,2021)

It must not be denied. Vaccines have become a critical public health intervention because for years, it has been reported that they prevent disease at a population level. Research has shown that they can protect, vaccinated individuals, and curb community transmission. This is all very important, but what is even more important is that this is only possible if the approved vaccine works well.

There have been officials from both the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and the European Medicines Agency (EMA), who during the early part of the vaccine rollout, signaled that they would consider approving vaccines that only diminished severity of illness, rather than protect against it.

I want you to think about that before you read any further.

Whether you have taken the vaccine or not is a matter of choice, and no one has the right to make that decision for you, or criticize the choice you have made for your body. There is a population that does demand for us to make correct decisions for them, and they are our children.

This article is directed towards anyone who is a parent, or works with children. I want the community to be educated on all aspects of this vaccine. I want you to have the right questions to ask, questions that will help you make a decision for yourself, and your family that you can live with. I encourage that you use this as a starting point, and do your own research. Google Scholar is a great place to start, but it all starts with asking the right question, and hearing all sides of the question posed.

Should we mandate a COVID-19 vaccine for children?
Douglas J. Opel, MD, MPH¹; Douglas S. Diekema, MD, MPH¹; Lainie Friedman Ross, MD, PhD^2,3

This research study spoke briefly on the discussions that are in progress about making a COVID-19 vaccine mandatory. There are those who think that this makes sense; there are already mandated vaccines that children need to have in school, so why not make the COVID-19 vaccine one of them? Our government officials might even suggest that this could be the only strategy that will work in order to keep our schools open on a regular basis.

Well, a good place to start here is to find out how COVID-19 affects the younger population. Children have immature immune systems, and this can make them prone to microbial infections, and have more severe symptoms. This is especially true for newborns, and young children. Like everything else, there are differences with this virus that need to be considered. A team of researchers (Kloc, Ghobrial,and, Kubiak, 2020), suggested that there is data that indicates children are rarely infected and have less severe symptoms.

There are some important differences between SARS-CoV-2 and influenza viruses. These are the differences that can be studied in order to determine whom to administer the vaccine to or not. I am curious, have these differences been studied. If it has been, has this information been released to the public?

Kloc, Ghobrial,and, Kubiak  (2020) suggest that there is one important difference, and it is the role of children in the transmission of disease. Research has reported that children can play a role in the spread of influenza, sometimes with life-threatening consequences for seniors and others. What also needs to be considered is that there are also other reports that have determined that children transmit SARS-Cov-2 less easily than the influenza virus.

What about our teenagers? Are there any considerations for them? Research has shown that older children are less vulnerable to COVID-19, and there is an explanation for that. One is that their immune systems have developed a long-lasting immunological memory against respiratory viruses. A little research will show you that the frequency and severity of infection in 0-19 year old children are much lower than in adults.

Just in the half dozen studies I looked at, the reported benefits of the COVID-19 vaccine seem to be largely for adults rather than children. When making a decision, you should also think about the fact that it is unlikely that one single vaccine will be equally effective in all populations. Our government officials could think about putting some money into researching different types of vaccines that induce different kinds of immunity. How can they do that? By developing a-needs driven approach, where the scientific community works toward researching different vaccine profiles that suit different communities, and demographics.

There is so much to be understood regarding the role of children in the transmission of SARS-CoV-2, and I can only imagine how overwhelming all of this is for caregivers, parents, teachers, and especially our children. What I will say is that research goes a long way. So far, there is research that shows the difficulty in justifying a COVID-19 vaccine in children for a disease that appears to be mild in most children, as well as the fact that they play a minimal role in spreading the infection to others.