Dr. Francis Collins of the National Institutes of Health Gives Updates on COVID-19 Vaccinations for Children and COVID-19 Testing

Dr. Francis S. Collins, Director of the National Institutes of Health, discusses vaccines for children ages 5-11 and the importance of COVID-19 testing

COVID-19 vaccines for kids 5-11 are now available, and CDC recommends everyone ages 5 and older get a COVID-19 vaccine to help protect against COVID-19. While COVID-19 tends to be milder in children compared with adults, it can make children very sick and cause children to be hospitalized. In some situations, the complications from infection can lead to death.

Vaccines for kids will help build on the progress we’ve made over the last 10 months and give more Americans the incredible protection that vaccines offer. Also, testing remains key to stopping the spread of COVID-19, especially as friends and family make plans to gather during the holidays.

Sound with: Dr. Francis S. Collins, Director of the National Institutes of Health

Link to soundbites: ­­­­­­ https://4media-group.box.com/s/esad6d5ljzgcn2iq6z7695thbikktoq6

Soundbite #1: The Pfizer vaccine has been approved for kids under 18, initially way back last summer for kids 12 to 17, and then very recently for kids 5 to 11. The 5 to 11 is one third the dose, but that’s been shown to be safe and effective, and those are available now, there are 20,000 locations in the U.S. that are ready to provide that kind of childhood vaccine. And you simply can go to vaccines.gov and find out what’s the place that’s closest to you that has the vaccine ready to go.

Soundbite #2: Testing can be a really good thing to add to our set of tools here to try to end this pandemic. And, tests are now readily accessible, including ones you can buy at the drug store and take home and do yourself for like 15 minutes. It’s very quick. It’s a good way to find out if you had any symptoms or even if you didn’t and you just want to be sure before you go into some other public setting that you aren’t carrying this virus.
We know this is a virus which can be carried by people with no symptoms. So, it’s really important to be sure you’re not the one who’s passing it on. So, I think a lot of people, maybe especially with holidays coming up, are thinking about the idea of first of all, be sure you’re vaccinated. And, even then, before you end up in a group of family or friends, do a test that morning to make sure that you’re not infected without realizing it. It’s very simple to do.
And, we want those tests to be widely accessible also in schools to try to keep kids from having to be sent home. So, there’s a lot of reasons now for testing interest to go up and we’re doing 2 or 3 million a test a day right now in the U.S. and expecting that to go up even further.

For more information, visit vaccines.gov.