COVID-19 shots for children begin
Californians 5 to 11 get their first vaccinations
SAN JOSE, Calif. — Scavenger hunts and blow-up animals greeted children at some of California’s vaccination sites Wednesday as children ages 5 to 11 got their first COVID-19 shots a day after the federal government approved kid-size doses of the vaccinations.
One enthusiastic 11-year-old summed up his experience in a word: “Amazing!” sixth grader Raghab Vist said. “I’ve been waiting a really long time to get vaccinated.”
Vist and his father, Hemant, who went to a vaccine clinic in San Jose, spoke of all the things they looked forward to doing again — eating in a restaurant, taking a train and traveling to family favorites like Disneyland. “It’s a very important milestone for us,” his father said.
As part of an ambitious plan to offer coronavirus vaccinations to California’s 3.5 million children in that age group, the state intends to offer the vaccines at locations including school clinics, pharmacies, pediatrician offices and county sites, many of which will launch in the coming days. Health officials said they are expecting 1.2 million initial doses of the pediatric vaccine.
Santa Clara County starting doling out shots Wednesday, and appointments quickly booked up. The county expects to receive about 55,000 doses this week and will open additional clinics at 80 school sites and send out mobile vaccine teams to low-income neighborhoods.
“We know that a lot of parents are anxious to get their children vaccinated with the holidays coming up,” said Dr. Jennifer Tong, who oversees the county’s mass vaccination program. “We received our shipment of vaccine yesterday, and we didn’t have any good reason to sit on it. So we said, let’s get this show on the road.”
Many of Santa Clara’s county sites were decorated with kid-friendly motifs like animals and included games like scavenger hunts, while others handed out coloring books, prizes and stickers to newly vaccinated young people.
Some pop-up clinics in Los Angeles County also started giving doses to children on Wednesday, the county department of health said.
California’s vaccination website, myturn.ca.gov, is expected to start offering appointments for this age group Thursday. Several other counties, including Contra Costa and Marin in Northern California, planned to begin their rollout at mass vaccination sites this weekend.
California has one of the highest vaccination rates in the country, but a minority remain skeptical of both the vaccine and the government’s assurances of its safety.
California has had some of the strictest masking and vaccination requirements in the country, but new cases and hospitalizations have been climbing again. In the past two weeks new cases have risen by 11 percent, and the number of hospitalizations has increased by more than 200.