A MARTÍNEZ, HOST:
For the first time in 30 years, the American Academy of Pediatrics is sharing vaccine recommendations that differ from the federal government's guidance. The pediatric group strongly recommends COVID-19 shots for children between the ages of 6 months and 2 years old. Now, the CDC is less explicit. It recommends the COVID vaccine for kids from six months to 17 years, quote, "based on shared clinical decision-making." Dr. Celine Gounder is an infectious disease specialist and editor-at-large for public health at KFF Health News, which frequently partners with NPR. Doctor, so the span of ages is obviously different in the two recommendations, but what sets those two apart the most?
CELINE GOUNDER: Well, I think it's the strength of the recommendation that children, or really infants between the ages of six months and two years, get a COVID vaccine. The CDC advice is basically that, well, you know, healthy kids, do they really need this? So talk to your doctor if there's a particular reason you're concerned. But what we've seen in the data is that while the risk of death may be lower in these infants than, say, the elderly, they have a very high risk of ending up in the ER or in the hospital, in the ICU. And that's not an insignificant risk.
I think most parents would opt for one shot versus having their child end up in the ICU. So this is really a recommendation that between the ages of six months and two years, while children have less developed immune systems, when you don't yet know if they have pre-existing conditions like immunocompromising conditions. And when they have smaller airways and are at higher risk for complications, during that period, those infants, their first interaction with COVID should be with the vaccine and not the virus.
MARTÍNEZ: So I'm guessing that you think that parents and other caregivers should have a lot of confidence in this recommendation from this professional body and also confidence in the vaccine.
GOUNDER: Well, and it's not just the American Academy for Pediatrics. So as part of this whole process, there's a group called the Vaccine Integrity Project out of the University of Minnesota that brought together all of the different medical professional societies as well as vaccine experts to do a comprehensive review of all of the new data that has come out since the CDC last did that review about a year ago. And that included some 16,000 studies that they looked at.
They narrowed it down based on the quality of the study and focused their analyses. But they really crashed that analysis over the last couple of months in order to inform the professional society's recommendations. So this is not just American Academy for Pediatrics. It's this independent group, which, by the way, has not taken pharmaceutical company money - I think that's really important to say here - that reviewed the data rigorously. And so the American Academy for Pediatrics is not just going out on its own. It has very solid ground to stand on in making these recommendations.
MARTÍNEZ: Doctor, do you think we're at a point in our history that when it comes to things like COVID and vaccines, that it all depends on who is in the White House, that'll determine how the government feels about these kinds of recommendations?
GOUNDER: I think that's exactly right. Unfortunately, this is an issue that has been highly politicized. And we've never seen anything like this before under a Republican or Democratic administration that vaccine recommendations have become political and not scientific.
MARTÍNEZ: Dr. Celine Gounder is an infectious disease specialist and editor-at-large for public health at KFF Health News, which frequently partners with NPR. Doctor, thank you.
(SOUNDBITE OF THE LITTLEST VIKING'S "NOT THE THEME FROM MAGNUM P.I.") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.
