COVID-19 vaccines for kids younger than 5 making their way around the state

Tatiana Parafiniuk-Talesnick and Connor Radnovich, Register-Guard
·3 min read

Parents looking to inoculate their little ones against COVID-19 may have a harder time finding where to go than when they found their own jabs.

Not all pharmacies will give shots to very young children, and vaccination clinics for this specific age group will be rare. Officials are recommending families go to their pediatricians to find about the vaccine.

State health officials estimate there are about 230,000 Oregonians between 6 months and 5 years old who are now eligible for vaccination.

Statewide, 19,200 doses of vaccine for children 5 and younger were shipped Sunday for delivery on Monday and 51,200 doses have been shipped altogether, according to the Oregon Health Authority. Additional doses were expected to arrive Tuesday and Wednesday. Doses were sent to federally qualified health centers, public health authorities, private providers, hospitals and a few pharmacies.

In the Salem area, these vaccine clinics are scheduled to have pediatric vaccines:

  • Oregon State Fair and Expo Center — 1935 Silverton Road NE; Thursdays through Saturdays, noon to 7 p.m., and Sundays, 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.

  • Salem Center Mall — 401 Center St NE #1170; Wednesdays through Fridays, 2-6 p.m.

Staff at PeaceHealth Sacred Heart Medical Center at Riverbend hope to be distributing the vaccine to ages 5 and younger within the week.

“As soon as we have the vaccine in our hand, (we’ll) be ready to go and be creating access for those patients who are interested in bringing their youngest children in,” said Dr. Serena Black, pediatrician and medical director of PeaceHealth children’s service line. “We are certainly getting phone calls in with parents that are asking about vaccine access.”

The hospital is not yet planning large-scale vaccine events but instead smaller clinics so the young patients can be closely observed for reactions.

Salem Health will also have the vaccine available at its clinics.

At this time, the only age group of Americans not eligible to receive a COVID-19 vaccine are children younger than 6 months. They can get some protection from the parent's vaccination during pregnancy.

In polling data from April, 18% of parents said they would vaccinate their young child right away, while 27% said they definitely wouldn't and 38% said they'd wait and see.

"The demand is going to roll out a little differently than it did (with previous age groups),” Salem Health spokeswoman Lisa Wood said.

Black encourages parents to take this step to protect their young children and use the opportunity to talk to their pediatricians about their children's general health and wellness.

“We have confidence in the vaccine safety,” Black said. “Both Moderna and Pfizer are good options and we see this as a really important step in keeping all children safe from the potential for more severe COVID disease.”

Moderna’s shots are given four weeks apart, meaning a child could have the fully intended protection against infection and severe disease by midsummer. The plan for Pfizer-BioNTech’s vaccine is to give two doses three weeks apart plus a third dose eight weeks later.

While children have been less impacted by this virus than older populations, they are still at risk for getting the virus and suffering from its worst impacts – more than 200 died from infections, according to data presented by the FDA.

Half of the young children hospitalized with COVID-19 did not have any preexisting conditions before they fell ill, the FDA said. Children can also get long COVID, which leaves people with a range of COVID-19 symptoms for weeks or months after infection.

Black said vaccination can protect children from some of COVID-19's complications.

“This is a first step in starting to develop some expanded population immunity that hopefully will begin to build antibodies and things to protect from future variants,” Black said. “If you've had at least one vaccine that should then hopefully protect against future waves of illness. We just can't predict how complicated those could be.”

USA TODAY reporters Adrianna Rodriguez and Cady Stanton contributed to this report.

Contact reporter Tatiana Parafiniuk-Talesnick at Tatiana@registerguard.com or 541-521-7512, and follow her on Twitter @TatianaSophiaPT. Want more stories like this? Subscribe to get unlimited access and support local journalism.

This article originally appeared on Register-Guard: Coronavirus vaccines for kids under 5 making way to Oregon