CHAOS OVER JABS FOR KIDS
Shock as experts don’t back them... ministers dramatically ask Whitty to reconsider... so what WILL parents think?
PLANS to vaccinate children are in chaos after government advisers yesterday refused to back a mass rollout.
After weeks of pressure for a decision, the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation ruled the 12-15 age group should not get Covid jabs.
It said the benefit to their health was not large enough to outweigh the risks.
But in an unprecedented move, Health Secretary Sajid Javid immediately asked the chief medical officer for a second opinion.
He told Chris Whitty to take into account ‘non-health benefits’, including whether vaccinating children would reduce disruption to their education. The professor will spend the next week weighing up evidence before making a recommendation.
Last night, a Government source told the Mail that jabbing 12 to 15-year-olds was still ‘very much on the table’. Many senior ministers strongly back the idea and Professor Whitty has hinted he could support it.
The JCVI’s decision means an inevitable delay to any rollout, as well as uncertainty for schools and parents just as millions of children return to class for the autumn term.
Education unions warned that ‘time was pressing’ and lessons would be disrupted. The decision highlights the growing tension
between ministers and advisers on the next phase of the vaccine rollout, following a fierce debate over plans for a booster programme for older adults.
As another 42,076 coronavirus cases and 121 deaths were reported:
■ Tory former health secretary Jeremy Hunt urged ministers to overrule dithering officials and ‘avert a winter catastrophe’ by urgently rolling out booster jabs;
■ Writing in the Mail, he said the UK had ‘no room for hesitation or delay’ in offering third doses to all adults;
■ Vaccine passports are set to be introduced for football matches, pop concerts and business conferences, despite mounting Tory opposition;
■ Four police officers were injured in clashes with anti-vaccine protesters in London;
■ A study suggested one in seven primary schools plan to keep class ‘bubbles’ amid fears over the spread of coronavirus;
■ Four million doses of the Pfizer jab will be sent to Australia, with the country reciprocating before the end of the year.
The mass rollout of vaccines was initially approved by the JCVI only for over-18s. The committee then extended it to 16 and 17-year-olds in a U-turn last month.
Since then it has come under intense political pressure to cover the 12-15 age group. Ministers fear the failure to vaccinate these children could lead to a surge
‘Lagging behind other nations’
in new cases as pupils return for the new academic year.
Cases in Scotland have soared since schools returned last month, with infections among youngsters now higher than at any time during the pandemic.
Tensions over the issue, which have been simmering for weeks, burst into the public domain on Thursday when Education Secretary Gavin Williamson said offering Covid jabs to 12 to 15-year-olds would be ‘deeply reassuring’ to parents.
But yesterday the JCVI said it was sticking to a ‘precautionary approach’ and only 200,000 at-risk children in this age group should get jabbed.
Because youngsters are so unlikely to get ill with Covid, the medical benefits were not judged to be great enough to outweigh the small risk of side effects, including heart inflammation.
The panel said it was not qualified to determine whether vaccinating children would have wider benefits. ‘It is still finely balanced,’ said Professor Anthony Harnden, deputy chairman of the JCVI.
‘We don’t think on the basis of health alone that we should be vaccinating 12 to 15-year-olds. But given this is so finely balanced there may be other considerations like education.’
Mr Javid said: ‘Along with health ministers across the four nations, I have officers the vaccination from written to a ask broader to that the of 12 they chief perspective, to consider 15-yearolds medical as
‘We suggested will then by consider the JCVI. the advice from the chief medical officers, building on the advice from the JCVI, before making a decision.’
He said that – given the importance of this issue – he would like the advice ‘as soon as possible’.
A government source expressed relief that the committee had finally given a response after months of deliberation.
The insider added: ‘Vaccinating 12 to 15-year-olds is still very much on the table.
‘In fact we are probably a step closer, as the chief medical officers who will now look at it will also be able to take into account wider health considerations, such as the impact on life chances and damage to mental health caused by disruption to education.’
Mr Javid’s move signals escalating frustration over the JCVI’s decision-making speeds.
The UK is now lagging behind several major nations which have already begun immunising youngsters, including France, Spain, Italy and the US.
Members of the JCVI, an independent body established in 1963, acknowledged they were facing political pressure.
Professor Adam Finn, a paediatrician from the University of Bristol who sits on the committee, said: ‘The recommendations that we’ve made twice already on vaccinating children were straightforward health-based ones.
‘What is different now is the calls from the professionals in education or from the teaching unions, and from the politicians to decide – and the timing of this in the context of the school year.
‘We have to acknowledge that the environment we’re working in is different. This is a very unique situation where it’s very hard to think
of another disease that has caused so much disruption to schooling. Therefore it’s not something that is likely to be replicated for other infectious diseases and vaccines in the future.’
But the delay in authorising vaccines for younger children means hundreds of thousands of pupils will be mixing for weeks before any rollout is approved by the JCVI.
Geoff Barton, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said he was ‘disappointed’ by the committee’s decision to exclude them. Professor Whitty will convene an expert panel to review evidence assessing the impact of the pandemic on children, particularly on disruption to education.
Some experts have argued that vaccinating children is the best way to reduce the size of a winter Covid wave and protect the elderly and vulnerable.
NHS England revealed yesterday that more than 620,000 youngsters aged 16 and 17 have been jabbed.
BORIS Johnson has rejected criticism of his pandemic handling by insisting he is scrupulously ‘following the science’.
Yesterday, those same scientists threw the Prime Minister under a bus.
Following months of umming and ahing over whether children should receive Covid jabs, the Joint Committee on Vaccines and Immunisation pitiably passed the buck.
The boffins concluded the rewards outweighed the risks. Yet inexplicably they refused to give the green light.
Now Professor Chris Whitty has the final say. But will that take days? Weeks? While Britain’s vaccine rollout, once the envy of the world, is mired in chaos, other Western nations are flying past us by jabbing kids.
With children back at school and some people’s immunity waning, it’s deranged not to strengthen the wall of protection.
This paper hears the anxieties. But on balance we believe that, with a Government which locks down at the drop of a hat, children should be vaccinated.
If infections surge, any draconian new restrictions would pummel the economy, and harm youngsters’ education – blighting their life chances.
By losing their bottle, the JCVI has not only alarmed parents. It risks severely damaging public trust in the vaccine.