Few Parents Intend to Have Very Young Children Vaccinated Against Covid

Less than a month after the FDA approved Covid-19 vaccines for very young children, a new survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation shows that the odds of many of them getting the shots are very low.

A majority of parents think the vaccine is riskier for their kids than the coronaviruses.

The administration of Covid shots for children in the age group of 6 months through 4 years has been minimal. A recent analysis of federal vaccine data by the foundation found that only a small percentage of eligible children have received shots since June 18. Only 18 percent of children who have been eligible for Covid shots since October had beenvaccinated at the same time.

43 percent of parents with children under 5 years old said they wouldn't have them vaccinations. 27 percent said they would wait and see, while 13 percent said they would have their children vaccinations only if necessary. Some parents wouldn't allow their youngest children to bevaccinated because of their opposition to Covid.

There has been a new analysis of parents views. Forty percent of children 5 to 11 years old have been vaccine free. 37 percent of parents in the new survey said they wouldn't give their child a Covid vaccine.

The parents were concerned about the vaccine's side effects and lack of research. Many parents said they would let their children take the risk of contracting Covid and not get a vaccine.

At a time when Covid cases are once again soaring and expected to worsen during the cold weather months, and as the possibility of new and potentially more dangerous coronaviruses remains, experts on childhood vaccinations said they viewed the parents' hesitation with alarm.

According to the president of the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases, some children get very sick from Covid and die from it. She was not part of the study.

Ms. Stinchfield said how a child will fare with Covid is unknown. She didn't have a marker for that. Half of the kids who come down with Covid are healthy kids. The idea of skipping the vaccine for your child is not a good one.

The latest report is based on an online and telephone survey from June 7 to June 17 of 1,847 adults with a child under 5 years old. There was a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points for the full sample and plus or minus 8 percentage points for parents with a child under the age of 5.

Republican parents are three times more likely than Democratic parents to say they will not have their child vaccine, according to a recent survey.

The federal government's information about the vaccine was confusing to a lot of parents. 70% of people said they hadn't discussed the shots with a doctor. Only 27 percent of parents who are considering the vaccine said they would make an appointment to talk about it.

Black and Hispanic parents are more concerned about the lack of access to Covid shots than white parents are. Almost half of Black parents worry about having to take time off from work to care for their children if they have side effects from vaccinations. Forty-five percent of Hispanic parents of young children said they were worried about finding a good location for the shots, and a third said they would have to pay a fee.

Ms. Stinchfield's daughter had to take off work to get vaccinations for her two young children. Ms. Stinchfield was with them. She said that the vaccine should be available in the evenings and on Saturdays.

Did her children have any problems? Ms. Stinchfield chuckled. She said that they put them in a kiddie pool because they were so happy. My granddaughter got a tan line from the bandage on her leg.