The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Sharp drop in kids getting vaccinated during pandemic
Free clinic hopes to buck trend
DANBURY — Maria Quillay knew her 13-yearold son had to keep up with his vaccines.
He had been getting them through the schoolbased health center at Rogers Park Middle School, but that stopped when district buildings closed more than two months ago.
When she heard a vaccination clinic would be offered at the school, she walked there with her son and two young daughters. Her youngest daughter sat in a stroller and all four wore masks.
She said she wanted her son to be vaccinated to protect him from illnesses.
“So he doesn’t get sick,” Quillay said in translated Spanish.
Quillay’s son was one of 18 kids who received shots on Thursday during the free, drive-thru clinic offered through a partnership between the school nurses and the Connecticut Institute for Communities, which operates the schoolbased health centers that offer medical, behavioral and dental health to students.
Thursday’s clinic was the first in a series the group plans to offer, with the goal to expand to other Danbury schools due to concerns locally and nationwide that students are not keeping up with their regular vaccinations during the coronavirus pandemic.
If these children are not vaccinated, the area could face an outbreak of preventable diseases like the whooping cough or the measles, on top of COVID-19, said Jolene Henion, nurse practitioner with the Rogers Park school-based health center.
“The big concern is we will lose the immunity for these other illnesses,” she said.
Vaccination decline
This is a fear the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shares. The organization has found a “notable decrease” in orders through the federally funded Vaccines for Children Program, which provides vaccines for about half of American children, including those who participated in the Danbury clinic.
“The identified declines in routine pediatric vaccine ordering and doses administered might indicate that U.S. children and their communities face increased risks for outbreaks of vaccine-preventable diseases,” medical professionals wrote in a CDC report. “Parental concerns about potentially exposing their children to COVID-19 during well child visits might contribute to the declines observed.”
Meanwhile, the state Department of Public Health reported state-supplied pediatric vaccine doses were down 13 percent in March and 43 percent in April of this year, compared with those months last year.
Once the pandemic dies down, pediatric offices may be overwhelmed with appointments for vaccines and other needs, said Melanie Bonjour, program manager for the school-based health centers.
“They’re going to be challenged to accommodate the patients that need the required vaccines, well visits, school physicals, annual physicals,” she said. “By us doing the clinic, we’re helping to keep kids in compliance with vaccines.”
Medical professionals at Pediatric Associates of Western Connecticut in Danbury have been focused on keeping children vaccinated during the pandemic, said Sherry Wright, nursing manager, who is in charge of vaccinations.
“Children need to be immunized,” she said. “You don’t want to have outbreaks of other illnesses because people didn’t get vaccinated during this pandemic.”
The group has continued to vaccinate children under 18 months in the office, and initially had nurses go outside to vaccinate older children in their cars, Wright said. But older children are now vaccinated in the office as well, she said.
Sick patients are not allowed in the office, and patients have their temperatures checked and are screened for the coronavirus, she said.
“Anyone that doesn’t want to come in, we reschedule them,” Wright said. “We’re very proactive and keeping in touch with them letting them know we have a safe environment here.”
Schools critical to providing vaccines
When the Danbury school district saw an influx of new students in the fall, nurses found many newly arrived immigrant children had not been vaccinated and did not have prior medical records.
The school-based health centers were critical in getting these estimated several hundred students on a vaccination schedule, said Kathy O’Dowd, coordinator of Danbury school health services.
“If we didn’t have that service, they would be delayed in getting into school,” she said.
The medical professionals said there has been discussion of the state relaxing requirements to allow children who were unable to be vaccinated during the pandemic to return to school. However, the state health department spokesman said there have been no changes to these requirements.
The vaccinations must be administered in various doses, and children need to stay on schedule to be immune, experts said. Thursday’s clinic helped with that.
“A lot of these kids are new to the country, so they’re getting caught up on those shots,” Henion said.
At Thursday’s clinic, families had to make an appointment beforehand to get vaccines for tetanus, polio, HPV, hepatitis A and more. The first five families arrived early.
“It shows they’re glad to have it available,” Henion said.
The clinic was a pilot, with the goal to vaccinate more children next week and to continue into the summer if necessary, Bonjour said. The Connecticut Institute for Communities could offer the clinic to other towns as well, she said.
“It’s a real need in the community to respond to,” she said.