A new poll exposes hesitancy among clinicians over their 5- to 11-year-olds getting a COVID-19 vaccine.
A Medscape survey found that 30% of physician respondents with children between 5 and 11 would not want them to be vaccinated and 9% were unsure, the news agency reported Tuesday.
More than 45% of nurses said they did not want their children to get a COVID-19 vaccine, and 13% were unsure.
Meanwhile, 31% of pharmacists said they would not get them vaccinated, and 9% were unsure.
The Medscape poll was conducted Nov. 3-11. It included responses from 325 physicians, 793 nurses and 151 pharmacists.
Clinicians were more likely to want vaccinations for their young children than the 510 consumers polled by WebMD around the same time, Medscape reported.
Nearly half, 49%, of the consumers polled who had 5- to 11-year-olds did not want them to get a COVID vaccine.
Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, earlier this month endorsed an advisory committee’s recommendation that 5- to 11-year-olds should be vaccinated with the Pfizer-BioNTech pediatric vaccine.
Her endorsement expanded vaccine recommendations to about 28 million U.S. children in this age group.
The CDC said the Pfizer vaccine proved nearly 91% effective at protecting children ages 5 to 11 from COVID-19. The agency also noted vaccine side effects were “mild, self-limiting, and similar to those seen in adults and with other vaccines recommended for children” in clinical trials.
For more information, visit The Washington Times COVID-19 resource page.
Health, The New York Today
