USA TODAY International Edition
More getting recommended shots
As kids go back to school this week, more of them are fully immunized against infectious diseases, a new study shows.
While the number of fully vaccinated kindergarten students has always been high — with more than 90% getting most vaccines — fewer 11- and 12- year- olds get all their recommended shots.
A new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention ( CDC), however, shows progress among this age group.
About 85% of teens in 2012 received the Tdap booster shot, which protects against tetanus, diphtheria and pertussis, also known as whooping cough, according to a national survey of teens ages 13 to 17. That’s up from 78% in 2011.
About 74% of teens in 2012 were vaccinated against meningitis, up from 71% in 2011. This vaccine protects against meningococcal meningitis, a rare but sometimes deadly form of bacterial meningitis, which causes an inflammation of the lining of the brain and spinal cord.
About 21% of boys in 2012 received at least one dose of vaccine against HPV, or human papillomavirus, the family of viruses that causes genital warts and cervical cancer, in addition to several other tumor types. That rate is up from 8% in 2011. The CDC and American Academy of Pediatrics recommend three doses of HPV vaccine for both boys and girls at age 11 or 12.
About 54% of girls received at least one dose of HPV vaccine in 2012, the same as in 2011. Only 33% of girls re- ceived all three recommended HPV shots.
About 75% of teens received the recommended two doses of chickenpox vaccine in 2012, up from 68% in 2011. Although chickenpox shots are supposed to be given in early childhood — a first dose at ages 12 to 15 months, and a second dose at ages 4 to 6 — the CDC recommends “catchup” doses for older kids who missed the vaccine as toddlers.
In spite of those increases, vaccine coverage for teens still falls below national goals. Only 36 states meet the CDC’s goals for Tdap coverage, while 12 meet the goals for meningitis vaccination and nine meet the goal for chickenpox, the new report says.
Pediatricians need to be as serious “about giving vaccines to teens as we are about giving vaccines to infants,” says Claire McCarthy, a pediatrician at Boston Children’s Hospital.