White House unveils plan to vaccinate children ages 5 to 11

ANKARA

The White House on Wednesday unveiled a plan to vaccinate children between the of ages 5 to 11 against the coronavirus, currently under consideration by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

"Millions of adolescents ages 12-17 have been safely vaccinated, and we know vaccines work," the White House said in a statement.

"Fully vaccinated individuals are 10 times less likely to be hospitalized with COVID-19 and have a high degree of protection, including against the Delta variant," it added.

President Joe Biden’s administration has procured enough shots to vaccinate the 28 million children ages 5-11 years old with a single dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine if authorized by the FDA and recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), it said.

The administration said it is also launching a partnership with the Children’s Hospital Association to work with more than 100 children’s hospital systems across the US to set up vaccination sites from November through the end of the year.

"Parents know and trust children’s hospitals to be there for their children’s medical needs, and these vaccination efforts will be no different. Pediatricians, pediatric specialists, nurses and team members will administer the vaccine to kids in trusted, family-friendly settings that serve kids every day," the statement said.

Distributions of the vaccines will be made via clinics at doctors’ offices, hospitals, pharmacies, community health centers and school- and community-based sites, it added.

The decision to vaccinate children of ages 5 to 11 comes before the FDA’s advisory committee meeting on Oct. 26 and the CDC’s meeting on Nov. 2-3.