Vaccine Megathread - See OP for threadbans

pc7

I'll still be holding off at this point, as mentioned in previous posts I'm very much pro-vaccine, have paid for vaccines that weren't yet on the HSE schedule here. But I will be very hesitant to give this one to my smallies at this point in time and as other have mentioned its not yet an issue or something that will be forced anytime soon. I'm very open minded and will keep an eye on things, vaccine hesitancy and anti-vax are very different.

pc7

muckisluck wrote: »

Why are we suddenly worrying about vaccinating children. Sure don't we know they are in school every day and there is no danger of spreading Covid in schools.

No one is worried, it came up for discussion on the vaccine discussion thread as it was mentioned Pfizer were hoping to get approval soon in US for younger kids.

revelman

Re vaccinating children, I think the primary concern is the emergence of variants. The more the virus spreads among children, the more it replicates and variants can emerge.

There is a Q&A here about why there is a need to vaccinate children. Some people might find this helpful.

https://www.uhhospitals.org/Healthy-at-UH/articles/2021/04/how-vaccinating-kids-and-teens-against-covid-19-can-slow-spread-mutations

pc7

I think the government will have to do a lot of work to entice people for the younger kids, based on the uptake of the kids flu vaccine last winter (both mine received the flu vaccine last winter when offered), tons didnt. I'm not sold yet on this one. That could change in time when more is known/kids done.

SusanC10

pc7 wrote: »

I'll still be holding off at this point, as mentioned in previous posts I'm very much pro-vaccine, have paid for vaccines that weren't yet on the HSE schedule here. But I will be very hesitant to give this one to my smallies at this point in time and as other have mentioned its not yet an issue or something that will be forced anytime soon. I'm very open minded and will keep an eye on things, vaccine hesitancy and anti-vax are very different.

Just curious - how old are your kids ?

Our son is 15 and bigger than I am - he will definitely be getting vaccinated.
Our daughter is 11 and will be 12 in the Summer. Again, she will be getting the Vaccine as soon as is allowed.

We too have paid for vaccines that were not freely available for the kids. Our son was 3 when he received the Swine Flu Vaccine too.

And agree - vaccine hesitancy and anti-vax are completely different things.

pc7

They are under 6 SusanC10, like you if they were 15 it would be very different I feel, but just at this point I'll be waiting to see the data and any side effects etc. and weigh it up then.

Beanybabog

Same here. I paid extra for the chicken pox vaccines, got the flu jabs last winter, got my own flu and whooping cough jabs when pregnant so I’m not anti vaccine but I don’t think I’d be running down to sign mine up (ages 4, 2 and 0). It’d be different if lots of kids were getting very sick. I imagine it’ll change in time and the Covid vaccine will be standard and part of the schedule and we won’t bat an eyelid

Zipppy

secman wrote: »

Update:
Felt fine in the office yesterday, home full dinner, about 830 pm started feeling warm. In bed at 9:30 pm wth a raging temperature, continued taking paracetamol . Eventually temperature passed at 3:00am. So far that's the only side effect, fingers crossed.
A colleague got the vaccine on Sunday and unfortunately she is getting full kitchen sink side effects.
You just dont know, my wife was 8 days with various side effects, mainly flu like, dead arm and fatigue.

I had my jab on monday...felt very tired yesterday evening but that's it.
seem fine today...fingers crossed that's it!

Supercell

pc7 wrote: »

I'll still be holding off at this point, as mentioned in previous posts I'm very much pro-vaccine, have paid for vaccines that weren't yet on the HSE schedule here. But I will be very hesitant to give this one to my smallies at this point in time and as other have mentioned its not yet an issue or something that will be forced anytime soon. I'm very open minded and will keep an eye on things, vaccine hesitancy and anti-vax are very different.

I was discussing this with my wife last night.
We are very much pro vaccination and paid for our three kids to get the chicken pox vaccine which isnt part of the HSE schedule.
My wife pointed out however that the regular ones on the schedule, and the chicken pox one have been done for years and years so we can be confidant that they are pretty safe.
However we cannot say that for the COVID ones yet, she is especially hesitant for our two girls. They are 6 and 7 years old so likely wont be able to be vaccinated for a while yet anyhow in all likelyhood, hopefully by then the safety of it with children will be better understood.

Lucas Hood

17,226 vaccines done Monday.

pc7

Lucas Hood wrote: »

17,226 vaccines done Monday.

Good for a Bank Holiday, I think Wednesday/Thursdays tend to be the big days. One of my parents in this week for theirs and its all the grandparents done

Zipppy

Lucas Hood wrote: »

17,226 vaccines done Monday.

17,225 others and ME !

GLaDOS

Both parents done over the last few days, sister due hers on Saturday (Cohort 4).

Big relief for the family.

pc7

GLaDOS wrote: »

Both parents done over the last few days, sister due hers on Saturday (Cohort 4).

Big relief for the family.

Yeah definitely hearing of loads more getting them now, most of my friends all the parents have a least one dose, finally feels like we are getting somewhere. They just need to hurry up and get to those of us in their 40's!

ebbsy

Will the Type 2's be done in the docs ?

I am 49.

Vicxas

Did we get an update on the new vaccine rollout yet?

Beanybabog

Is the rollout moving faster in Dublin? I know of 60 year olds who got vaccinated within days of registering but outside Dublin where my folks are no one bar one friends 69 year old mother got an appointment. One friend told me one of the vaccination centres isn’t even open yet

Dexpat

I'm early 50s and was happy to wait to register next week when it opened for my age, but I got a call to go to my GP tomorrow for it.

I have asthma but it's not too bad and I know a few more people quite a bit younger than me with mild underlying conditions who have been called as well. Didn't ask which vaccine it was but I'm not bothered as long as it's done.

Things seem to be picking up pace now which would give a lot of hope for the Summer and some sort of normality.

Beanybabog

Dexpat wrote: »

I'm early 50s and was happy to wait to register next week when it opened for my age, but I got a call to go to my GP tomorrow for it.

I have asthma but it's not too bad and I know a few more people quite a bit younger than me with mild underlying conditions who have been called as well. Didn't ask which vaccine it was but I'm not bothered as long as it's done.

Things seem to be picking up pace now which would give a lot of hope for the Summer and some sort of normality.

I heard this too. I know one girl with Asthma who was surprised to be called. Younger than you and didn’t think she was severe enough to be called early. I’m only speculating but I assume the admin work that goes into sorting out who should be prioritised is massive, it’s probably easier to just call all patients on your books who have asthma

JDD

I've got to admit, I'm of the same mind as the rest of you. Mine are 9, 6 and 4.

It's one thing choosing to get the vaccination yourself - either to protect yourself from illness or for a benefit to society as a whole i.e. protecting those adults that cannot take the vaccine, or preventing variants from emerging.

It's different when you are charged with someone else's health. You have to be much more conservative. I understand that the proportion of US infections being children is rising, that is inevitable where most of the over-30's population is vaccinated and their society opens up again.

There's no getting away from the fact that these vaccines are new, and have not yet been widely tested on children. I would be very hesitant about putting my children forward for vaccination yet, when the risk of covid to them is very low. I don't think it is my role to choose to expose them to risk (albeit probably a very small one) for the benefit of society as a whole.

revelman

Beanybabog wrote: »

Is the rollout moving faster in Dublin? I know of 60 year olds who got vaccinated within days of registering but outside Dublin where my folks are no one bar one friends 69 year old mother got an appointment. One friend told me one of the vaccination centres isn’t even open yet

Well Cork sounds very similar to Dublin. There are 60 year olds being vaccinated this week.

Lumen

JDD wrote: »

I've got to admit, I'm of the same mind as the rest of you. Mine are 9, 6 and 4.

It's one thing choosing to get the vaccination yourself - either to protect yourself from illness or for a benefit to society as a whole i.e. protecting those adults that cannot take the vaccine, or preventing variants from emerging.

It's different when you are charged with someone else's health. You have to be much more conservative. I understand that the proportion of US infections being children is rising, that is inevitable where most of the over-30's population is vaccinated and their society opens up again.

There's no getting away from the fact that these vaccines are new, and have not yet been widely tested on children. I would be very hesitant about putting my children forward for vaccination yet, when the risk of covid to them is very low. I don't think it is my role to choose to expose them to risk (albeit probably a very small one) for the benefit of society as a whole.

This isn't a choice you have to make now, since the vaccines aren't yet approved for children, in fact AFAIK the trials haven't even taken place yet.

Are you saying that you've made a decision in advance of any trials or approval process? That whatever the outcome, you're not interested?

If so, what specific deficits are there in the approval process?

To date the regulators have been ridiculously conservative even for adults for whom COVID poses a significantly higher risk. Does that not give you confidence in the process?

FWIW, if these vaccines are approved for children, I'll be vaccinating mine.

duffman13

pc7 wrote: »

I'll still be holding off at this point, as mentioned in previous posts I'm very much pro-vaccine, have paid for vaccines that weren't yet on the HSE schedule here. But I will be very hesitant to give this one to my smallies at this point in time and as other have mentioned its not yet an issue or something that will be forced anytime soon. I'm very open minded and will keep an eye on things, vaccine hesitancy and anti-vax are very different.

I'm in a similar boat to be honest however both of mine are under 3 and a way off. Got them chicken pox vaccine and the like but I'll be watching and reading the trials far more than I did before getting my own vaccine. Nothing wrong with caution or hesitancy. To be fair it's probably a long path to my kids age but can understand the reluctance.

Have a colleague who had low platelets and ended out hospitalised after first dose of AZ. She has 9 year old, not anti vaccine at all but is flat out insisting her child won't be getting a covid vaccine due to her experience.

It's easy to say it's only 1 in however many thousand/million but id imagine if it happened to you or someone close it might change your tune a little as it did hers.

The bigger challenge will be getting a large/full uptake in the adult population

Lumen

duffman13 wrote: »

It's easy to say it's only 1 in however many thousand/million but id imagine if it happened to you or someone close it might change your tune a little as it did hers.

If you applied that level of risk aversion consistently you would never allow your child into a car, since the road traffic fatality rate for under 15s is around 1 per 100,000 per year.

GeorgeBailey

Before the vaccines had been used on adults there was a good number of people saying they'd be hesitant to get something developed so quickly. While that issue hasn't disappeared completely, the number of those people reduced significantly after the rollout started. I think once people see other kids around the world getting the vaccine without issue that a lot of the hesitancy will disappear.

daydorunrun

is_that_so wrote: »

There's no insistence on it just as there isn't for adults. Vaccines are not under licence for emergency use in the EU.

https://www.ema.europa.eu/en/glossary/conditional-marketing-authorisation

Call it Conditional marketing authorisation or emergency authorisation, they both mean the same thing.

is_that_so

duffman13 wrote: »

I'm in a similar boat to be honest however both of mine are under 3 and a way off. Got them chicken pox vaccine and the like but I'll be watching and reading the trials far more than I did before getting my own vaccine. Nothing wrong with caution or hesitancy. To be fair it's probably a long path to my kids age but can understand the reluctance.

Have a colleague who had low platelets and ended out hospitalised after first dose of AZ. She has 9 year old, not anti vaccine at all but is flat out insisting her child won't be getting a covid vaccine due to her experience.

It's easy to say it's only 1 in however many thousand/million but id imagine if it happened to you or someone close it might change your tune a little as it did hers.

The bigger challenge will be getting a large/full uptake in the adult population

For now that looks to be a low risk, polls have people up in the 80s to take a vaccine. Young women seem to be the only group who are more reticent. Yet we still don't know if we need that many. Data out of Israel suggests that we may see a good falloff in positivity rates at lower levels.

is_that_so

daydorunrun wrote: »

Call it Conditional marketing authorisation or emergency authorisation, they both mean the same thing.

EMA don't do emergency authorisation. You have a position on this and that's fine. None of this is mandatory or will be mandatory.

daydorunrun

JTMan wrote: »

There are very good reasons for those aged 15 and under to get the vaccine.

Firstly, it might be needed for life to return to normal. Ireland has the highest under 16 population in Europe at 26%. On top of that, we have 6-16% of the 16+ population who will not get the vaccine. Hence, up to 42% of the population who might be 'out of scope' currently. The higher the percentage we vaccinate the higher the chance that we achieve herd-immunity or even containment.

Secondly, kids can get sick from Covid. Some very sick. In the US, 22% of new cases are coming from children (with many adults vaccinated). It is not just about stopping transmission, it is about stopping disease too.

Thirdly, we need to think global, even if Ireland gets to a containment stage, it is likely to be some time before there are enough vaccines for the world. If the virus is out there, and travel resumes as it will, kids need to be protected too.

Just on the second point- we cannot read too much into percentages such as ‘22% of cases coming from children’ because as older people are vaccinated or have immunity through infection their percentage goes down meaning other cohorts go up as a %.

This is about serious illness and death, if your 3 point is to be acted on as soon as we have our older and vulnerable vaccinated we should be helping the older and vulnerable in poorer countries rather than vaccinating non vulnerable kids here.

ginoginelli

Kids are ultimately going to have to be vaccinated if we want to end the pandemic globally. I understand the hesitancy with young children, but the vaccine will be administered in age increments, and with trials of each group first.

By the time it get to to under 10s in ireland there will be a significant amount of real world data on efficacy and safety which hopefully will put concerned parents at ease.