Vaccines for young children making their way around LA County

0

Lello Tesema‘s daughter, Semaye Mussie, was one of the first children younger than 5 to receive the Pfizer vaccine on Wednesday, June 22, at Los Angeles County Department of Public Health’s dispensing point at Ted Watkins Memorial Park, a longtime vaccination site in South Los Angeles.

She had been waiting for a safe opportunity to vaccinate her 1-year-old.

“The process was easy,” Tesema said. “The registration was quick and I liked that it was outdoors.”

She said she understands why parents are hesitant to vaccinate their young children, but that she did the research and was confident about her decision.

COVID-19 vaccine doses for children under age 5 became more widely available across L.A. County on Wednesday following shipping delays that stalled the rollout of the pediatric shots.

Federal authorities approved the doses for kids as young as 6 months over the weekend. The approval applies to vaccines manufactured by Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech.

Dr. Nava Yeganeh, a pediatric infectious disease specialist and medical director of vaccine preventable disease control at Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, was at the park overseeing seven nurses administering the vaccine.

“We have been here and will be here every day to help people who want the vaccine (and) access to the vaccine,” Yeganeh said. “But what’s most important about today is we are giving the vaccination to children under the age of five which is the group that has been waiting for the last 18 months for the opportunity to get protected. It’s a very joyful occasion for us here and for the parents and we are very excited.”

County officials have been doing outreach in the community to let the public know about this latest development in the fight against the virus through faith-based organization outreach teams, community-based organizations and community healthcare workers who have been spreading the word.

Health officials noted that young children are considered at lower risk of becoming severely ill or dying from COVID, but they said the risk is higher among unvaccinated children. They also contend that unvaccinated children are at higher risk of developing Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome in Children, or MIS-C.

According to the county, over the past three months, unvaccinated children aged 12-17 were nearly four times more likely to be hospitalized with COVID than vaccinated children. Among vaccine-eligible children in the county who contracted confirmed cases of MIS-C, 65% were unvaccinated, officials said.

Some Southland pharmacies and pediatrician offices began administering the doses Tuesday, but availability was limited at many county run sites. According to the county Department of Public Health, shipping issues were causing the delay, with more widespread availability on Wednesday.

The county estimated the shots would ultimately be available at more than 900 vaccination sites. Information on locations and scheduling appointments is available online at vaccinatelacounty.com, or in Spanish, vacunatelosangeles.com.

The county on Wednesday reported another 5,575 COVID infections, raising the overall total from throughout the pandemic to 3,076,849.

Stay connected with us on social media platform for instant update click here to join our  Twitter, & Facebook

We are now on Telegram. Click here to join our channel (@TechiUpdate) and stay updated with the latest Technology headlines.

For all the latest Health & Fitness News Click Here 

Read original article here

Denial of responsibility! Rapidtelecast.com is an automatic aggregator around the global media. All the content are available free on Internet. We have just arranged it in one platform for educational purpose only. In each content, the hyperlink to the primary source is specified. All trademarks belong to their rightful owners, all materials to their authors. If you are the owner of the content and do not want us to publish your materials on our website, please contact us by email – [email protected]. The content will be deleted within 24 hours.
Leave a comment