CBS News’ “Face the Nation” host Margaret Brennan, who seemed a bit overexcited about getting her kids vaccinated against the Chinese Wuhan flu, frankly, sat down Sunday with former FDA commissioner and Pfizer board member, Dr. Scott Gottlieb to talk about the Biden FDA’s roll-out of the COVID vaccine for the littlest of children: ages 6 months to 5 years old.
Expect a slower rollout of vaccines to infants, toddlers & preschoolers in part because you need specially trained vaccinators to administer them to those under age 3 says @ScottGottliebMD #COVID19 https://t.co/pvlfD3HeVm
— Margaret Brennan (@margbrennan) June 19, 2022
He said, in part: (emphasis mine)
There are going to be pharmacies that are vaccinating children. CVS is going to move it into their pharmacies, but they’re only moving it into the pharmacies with advanced care providers with their MinuteClinics. You’re probably not going to see clinic stood up. Maybe around children’s hospitals, you’ll see some clinics stood up.
But most people are probably going to get vaccinated and their pediatricians’ offices. And it’s going to take a little bit more time to get the vaccine into those local settings, because it’s more difficult to vaccinate a child who is very young. You need people who are specially trained to do that.
His appearance comes on the heels of the news late last week that a panel at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) gave their OK on the vaccine for little kids. The CDC director Dr. Rochelle Walensky signed off on the decision Saturday, according to Scripps National News, which added that the FDA had already voted its recommendation during the week.
#BREAKING: The CDC's vaccine advisers have unanimously agreed to recommend COVID-19 vaccines for children under 5. https://t.co/oZEUEsT7ND
— Scripps National News (@ScrippsNational) June 18, 2022
News of Walensky signing off on it comes hours after CDC advisory panel unanimously agreed that COVID-19 vaccines should be made available to children as young as 6 months.
The CDC’s vote comes the same week the Food and Drug Administration authorized Moderna’s and Pfizer’s COVID-19 shots for infants, toddlers and preschoolers.
Scripps also reported on details of the vaccines from the two manufacturers:
Pfizer would come as a three-dose vaccine for children 6 months to 4 years old, and Moderna’s two-dose vaccine would be for children 6 months to 5 years old.
The dosage for children for both vaccines will be significantly lower than the adult version.
Did you notice, like I did, the sorta weird wording in Gottlieb’s comments above? I highlighted them, just in case. It’s evident that there’s an attempt to mold a narrative that this is different from adults and others getting the shots. Since you’ve read this far, you likely took the time (unlike most, modern news consumers who just glance at headlines and ledes) and listened to the entire clip. So, you know Gottlieb means a primary care doctor, whom a patient is already familiar with — in the case of children, that’s usually the pediatrician they’ve always had.
The medical establishment might finally be admitting something it would rather not admit–that this should have been how vaccinations were handled all along, and left as a medical decision between patient and doctor. The silver lining for American families is it looks like that’s what will happen here with the children’s vaccine.
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