Parents of Idaho children ages 5 to 11 have been slow to get their kids immunized for COVID-19, according to a Southeastern Idaho Public Health official.
The federal Centers for Disease Control expanded eligibility of the Pfizer-BioNTech pediatric COVID-19 vaccine to cover about 28 million children ages 5 to 11 on Nov. 2.
Through Dec. 5, just 19,391 Idaho children in the age group — 11 percent of them — had received at least one shot of the vaccine, according to Idaho Public Health. By comparison, 39 percent of children ages 12 to 15 had received at least one shot, and 56.6 percent of the total population of Idaho residents over age 5 had received at least one shot.
In Bannock County, SIPH has been administering about five COVID-19 vaccinations for 5- to 11-year-olds per day on average, said Allison Bischoff, clinical services director. Bischoff emphasized that there are a lot of pediatric providers in Bannock County who are also giving the shot, but it’s clear to her, nonetheless, that there hasn’t been a lot of interest in the vaccination among local parents of young children.
“Through Dec. 5, it’s a pretty low uptake, especially for our region,” Bischoff said.
The good news, Bischoff said, is that pediatric vaccination rates, though slow, don’t seem to have hit a peak yet.
Dr. Greg Kostur, the pediatrician for Health West, would like to see the state’s vaccination rate climb in general, as it’s significantly below the U.S. rate. While 61.9 percent of Idaho residents ages 12 and older have had at least one dose of the vaccine, the national rate is 81.5 percent.
Kostur said Health West recently had to throw away a couple of hundred doses of the Moderna vaccine because nobody would take them.
With adults, Kostur said demand for the vaccine was steady until the area hit a vaccination rate of about 40 percent, and then demand “hit a cliff.” Thus far, that hasn’t happened yet with the pediatric vaccine, Kostur agreed.
Children ages 5 to 11 receive about a third of the adult dose of the COVID-19 Pfizer vaccine, and pediatric doses can be stored for up to 10 weeks without the extreme cold storage required for the adult version of the vaccine.
“I can compare the (pediatric COVID-19 vaccine) demand right now to be fairly similar to what I see for the flu shot,” Kostur said, adding Health West has administered about 40 pediatric vaccinations during a three-week period.
Kostur fears demand will soon drop before ever truly taking off for 5- to 11-year-olds. He has 200 pediatric doses available and said he would have no trouble refilling his supply if needed.
Kostur initially assumed the most effective approach to convincing parents to get their young children vaccinated would be reminding them that the vaccine protects the health of their children and those whom their children encounter.
Instead, Kostur has found parents who get the vaccine for 5- to 11-year-olds tend to be more concerned about the possible inconveniences of having to quarantine following a positive COVID-19 test.
To them, Kostur likes to share the story of a family who came to Health West after a family member had a positive test. The family quarantined due to their close contact with a confirmed case, and one by one, each family member got sick. The final child in the family who caught COVID-19 wound up missing more than a month of school from start to finish.
“The way to avoid these ridiculous isolation situations is to get vaccinated,” Kostur said, emphasizing that a vaccinated person is 80 to 90 percent less likely to catch COVID-19 from a family member.
Kostur said that the most important reason to get a child vaccinated is to protect the health of the child and the people around him or her, understanding that children are not immune from COVID-19 and that they can transmit the virus to others.
“I think with kids probably the biggest reason people are leery of (the vaccine) is there is a very persistent myth that COVID-19 is not dangerous to kids,” Kostur said, explaining COVID-19 has resulted in hundreds of children dying nationwide and thousands of children being hospitalized — many of them with lingering and even lifelong health consequences.
Call Health West at 208-232-3355 to make an appointment for a free pediatric COVID-19 vaccine.