Parents lag on vaxxing kids 5-11

By COLLIN GALLANT on July 15, 2022.

cgallant@medicinehatnews.com@CollinGallant

COVID vaccines are now approved for children aged six months to five years, but figures suggest a majority of parents in Medicine Hat showed hesitancy with their kids.

That led to less than half setting up and getting a first dose for kids aged 5-11, and fewer still following through with a second dose for their child, according to data from Alberta Health.

That could speak to worry among parents about the effects of the recently developed vaccine on their youngest children, even though the vast majority of parents have had the vaccine themselves and okayed it for teenaged dependents.

Dr. Paul Parks, head of emergency medicine at Medicine Hat Regional Hospital, has advocated for widespread vaccine uptake saying inoculation provides a safe, key protection for personal and public health.

“As COVID cases are surging, the more Albertans we can have fully vaccinated the better,” he told the News on Thursday. “My children are older and already have the vaccine, but I would absolutely get them vaccinated if they were under six.

“We are seeing more COVID positive patients now, so a seventh wave is coming.”

More than 1.7 million children in Canada aged six months to five years old are now eligible for shots as Health Canada approved the Moderna vaccine, also known as SpikeVaxx, on Thursday.

The dosage, one quarter the size used for adults, prevented COVID symptoms from developing in half of children aged younger than two years and in 36 per cent of the remainder aged under 5. The U.S. approved two vaccines for the age group last month.

Alberta will now decide how to roll it out in the province.

In Medicine Hat, 78.8 per cent of the population, regardless of age, has at least one-shot, including 87 per cent of adults. All but 3 per cent of Hatters in all eligible age categories have followed up with a second shot or further boosters.

While 83 per cent of teenaged minors (aged 12-18) are vaccinated, the figure for the next youngest cohort drops off steeply.

In Medicine Hat only two out of five children aged 5-11 have received a first shot, with the number essentially stagnant since early February.

The figure was at 2,235 individuals as of Thursday, according to data publicly released by the Alberta Health ministry. That represents 40 per cent of local children in the age group, with only 150 added since Feb. 1, six months ago.

In rural areas the percentage of first shots in the age group falls to 28 per cent in Cypress County, 13.4 per cent in the County of Newell, including Brooks, and just 7.9 per cent in the County of Forty Mile.

Across the province, only half of children in the middle age group got a first dose, and the second-dose figure falls to one-third.

There are considered to be 68,200 residents in the combined Medicine Hat and Redcliff area (used in the statistics).

Calculations show as many as 3,500 individuals in Medicine Hat are younger than five.