California school kids must get Covid vaccine under new bill
latimes.com
latimes.com
There's a huge difference. This vaccine has a miniscule benefit for kids. We've never before mandated a vaccine for children that didn't provide a sizable benefit to the child him or herself.
Mandatory vaccinations for school-age children exclusively target illnesses with high childhood morbidity/mortality: Measles, Polio, Chickenpox, DtP.
SARS-CoV2, thankfully, is safer than influenza for kids. As of right now, the CDC says that 727 kids have died in the US with Covid throughout the entire pandemic:
ETA: here's the current list of required vaccines in FL http://www.floridahealth.gov/programs-and-services/immunizat...
In recent years, tetanus has been fatal in approximately 11% of reported cases. Cases most likely to be fatal are those occurring in persons age 60 years or older and unvaccinated persons. In about 20% of tetanus deaths, no obvious pathology is identified and death is attributed to the direct effects of tetanus toxin.
https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/pubs/pinkbook/tetanus.html
I'd argue the heb-b vaccine is a good idea too.
https://bmcpublichealth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s...
> Figure 1 shows the global age-sex distribution of tetanus mortality in 2015. Tetanus deaths were concentrated in neonates when they were compared with deaths in each of the other age categories
Hep B infection during childhood leads to chronic hepatitis in 95% of cases:
https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/hepatitis-b
> Hepatitis B infection acquired in adulthood leads to chronic hepatitis in less than 5% of cases, whereas infection in infancy and early childhood leads to chronic hepatitis in about 95% of cases. This is the basis for strengthening and prioritizing infant and childhood vaccination.
In both cases, children are being vaccinated for their own direct benefit, not some vague, external benefit to others.
(Also, it's worth pointing out that we mandate these vaccinates for school-age children because that's the first time such a mandate can be enforced. Babies are supposed to be vaccinated for both within the first six months of life: https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/schedules/hcp/imz/child-adolesc...)
As far as we know the protection doesn't even last a year, a tetanus vaccine might need refreshment after 10 years but would still offer some protection.
Above details from this overview: https://www.capradio.org/articles/2021/07/24/no-california-d...
I, for one, am glad to live in a state with strong and consistent vaccination requirements for school children.
Do you think kids should be mandated to be vaccinated for a disease they've already had? What if that vaccine does not appear to prevent illness or spread? What if the vaccine does not have full FDA approval?
This is not a new approach. California already mandates that schoolchildren get vaccinated for chicken pox. It's not sufficient to have gotten the disease: https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/health/story/2019-...
I'm not going to argue about this so will leave your other questions unanswered. Take care.
The Covid-19 vaccines famously are not sterilizing, and Covid-19 itself does not pose any sort of significant risk to otherwise healthy children.
https://arstechnica.com/science/2022/01/unvaccinated-5x-more...
Even if COVID-19 didn't hurt kids directly, a rational state could require them to get vaccinated to tamp down on a major source of community spread and protect people who are hurt more by the virus.
Getting vaccinated is far from the worst thing the government makes people do. The U.S. government still runs the military draft, and has forced unwilling people to go fight and die in miserable circumstances for a cause they think is unjust. By comparison, getting a vaccine to protect the community is small potatoes.
Prove this first, then weigh the risk/benefits publicly.
> The U.S. government still runs the military draft,
The United States military has been all-volunteer since 1973, no?
Young men still have to register just in case they change their mind.
To the best of my knowledge all the vaccines on the required list are fully FDA approved. COVID-19 one has a lesser "FDA emergency authorization".
Just to be clear this is a proposed bill. Lots of bills are proposed that don't even get voted on. Long way from becoming law.
Seems like most urban CA people would go for something like this.
Help prevent spread of Covid with virtually no downside.
Californians should ALL be mandated to take the vaccine not just kids.
Masks could also possibly be a target for a future permanent mandate by the government of CA.
COVID is just one of many respiratory diseases that are dangerous to certain vulnerable groups.
Drug resistant TB, SARS, the Flu.
California should really be the leader in pathogen safety here and enact vaccine and mask mandates for ALL of it's citizens.
Gloves could be a good safety option as well.
One of my big fears is that this is coming. People have been emboldened and received very little pushback against forcing others to get the covid vaccine, and to prove it wherever they go. How long until we start hearing "flu vaccine saves lives, I have the right to know if someone around me isnt vaccinated, etc etc". I'm almost afraid to say it out loud, and I bet a lot of people here already support it.
Childhood vaccination against Polio and the other big and previously debilitating childhood illnesses is nothing like mandating a covid vaccine, especially during a live event where the guidance and effectiveness is changing daily.
Overall, it's confusing to me because I see people arguing "no one should be forced to get a jab who doesn't want one!" But so far I'm not seeing instances of that occurring, so it's unclear why they're arguing that (unless it's mostly a pre-emptive, which is fine and understandable).
For all people in California.
We vaccinate kids against chickenpox too (though we didn't when I was a kid). I remember my 1st grade class singing happy birthday to me over the phone. I was home sick, missed a week of school. I didn't die, I didn't go to the hospital.
Fast forward: I got my kids chicken-pox vaccines.
Edit: it looks like chicken pox might've posed similar risk to kids as Covid, maybe up to 2x more? Not 100% sure of that, and I have a weak belief that Omicron is more dangerous to kids. I don't think that affects my overall point, but better to be clear and not overstate things.
Second edit: Varicella in the original tweet is Chickenpox, which would indicate less danger to kids. Not sure why the numbers are different.
Some of these vaccines are still not mandated by most states, and many states have exemptions if you demonstrate immunity.
There are other required vaccinations. But those are for illnesses that virtually no kid actually gets. By next school year, probably 3/4 of all kids will have had COVID.
Because everybody has been vaccinated and we’ve reached heard immunity? Maybe we’ll get there one day with Covid, if everybody will get vaccinated, or at least as well as the flu
Also, even if herd immunity is impossible, some reduced spread is a good thing by itself
There is no vaccine that prevents some kind of infection with 100% accuracy across all population.
Basically implies you know jack about herd immunity.
But there are vaccines that are more than ~75% effective at preventing infection, which is the number that Fauci kept mentioning when this all started.
Claiming things that vaccines don't work, doesn't prevent infection, impossible to achieve herd immunity with them- helps absolutely nobody.
https://www.businessinsider.com/delta-variant-made-herd-immu...
Covid is clearly coming to an end.
The UK and Ireland just lifted all restrictions. [0] [1]
The East Coast is over the hump. [2]
School kids are probably last on the long list of cohorts that should be getting a vaccine mandate. [3]
Further, the vaccine isn't sterilizing. It's 2 strains behind. How does this mandate parse with an open ended definition of "fully vaccinated"?
> Under the bill, the California Department of Public Health could mandate vaccines in the future without requiring the state to offer personal belief exemptions, a move that would make it easier to add COVID-19 boosters or other immunizations for students without a lengthy legislative process.
This is flat out absurd.
[0] https://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory/uk-lifts-covid-restr...
[1] https://consent.yahoo.com/v2/collectConsent?sessionId=1_cc-s...
[2] https://www.mwra.com/biobot/biobotdata.htm
[3] https://data.cdc.gov/NCHS/Provisional-COVID-19-Deaths-by-Sex...
Moderna is banned in certain european countries for people under 30 because of myocarditis risk.
Banned visiting beaches during the early phases - you had to crowd into indoor spaces.
What - actually - is the current death rate among children from this thing?
I wish these stories would come with actual data. Any questioning of the traditional line - gets slammed down.
Quick note - if they say sky is falling (ie, kids > 5 dying at high rates - mandatory vaccination or no school on an unapproved vaccine for this age group) but won't actually share the data despite the incredible high number of cases (ie, should be able to do some analysis by now) they are probably hiding something.
"Still, among Omicron cases reported to TESSy, 1.14% were hospitalised, 0.16% required ICU admission/respiratory support, and 0.06% died" - https://www.ecdc.europa.eu/en/news-events/weekly-epidemiolog...
Can anyone find an age based version of this?
You mean the beaches that were closed during the same time they had banned large indoor gatherings?
835 total [1]
[1] https://data.cdc.gov/NCHS/Provisional-COVID-19-Deaths-Focus-...
> Child restraint systems are often used incorrectly. An estimated 46% of car seats and booster seats are misused in a way that could reduce their effectiveness.
https://www.cdc.gov/transportationsafety/child_passenger_saf...
Do you also oppose mandating car seats and seat belts?
By the same logic, are car seats and seat belts injected into the body?
It also illustrates a point: some people are really quite paranoid about their kids and covid but happily take other higher risks like driving around their kids in cars, which even with safety devices pose a higher risk, citing the data you just posted.
I would oppose checkpoints which denied people travel privileges unless their seatbelts were checked to be used properly.
Can you produce a source backing up your claim?
The death rate for school age children is very low.
I think before anyone goes and decides if this vaccine deserved a mandate, they should decide conditions for which a vaccine should be considered for a mandate based on measured risks. What we’re having now is emotionally and politically motivated.
The article says otherwise:
> “We need to make sure schools are safe so that all parents are comfortable sending their children to school,” said Pan, a pediatrician whose legislation has strengthened oversight of vaccine exemptions in previous years. “And we want to keep schools open.”
Wow, I haven't heard that slogan since 2020. Do you still believe it? Because even the CDC and Pfizer execs and European newspapers are admitting that the vaccines don't prevent infection or transmission.
> It’s not political.
It's hard to fathom that you believe that, because even people in favor of vaccine mandates can recognize political influences, like the many billions of dollars being made by the corporations producing the vaccines and the money they donate to political campaigns.
Yes, I still believe it. Sure, they don't prevent infection or transmission. The vaccines cause you to have less symptoms. By being less symptomatic you're less likely to spread the disease.
> It's hard to fathom that you believe that
Yes, I believe getting everyone vaccinated is not political. It's a public safety issue.
Yes, I can understand that politicians can be influenced. Regardless of whether that's the case here I still would have no issue with pushing for everyone to get vaccinated. The billions being made by the corporations producing the vaccine are a pittance in comparison to all the negative consequences of letting it spread uncontrolled.
> they don't prevent infection or transmission. The vaccines cause you to have less symptoms. By being less symptomatic you're less likely to spread the disease.
You seem to be saying, they don't prevent transmission, but they prevent transmission.
Maybe what you mean is that, while the vaccines don't guarantee that an infected person won't transmit the virus to another person, they make it less likely.
But this doesn't seem to be what the CDC, Pfizer, et al are saying. They're simply saying that the vaccines don't prevent infection or transmission. I haven't seen them qualify that statement with any probabilities; if they had, it would be something one could argue about (productively).
> Yes, I believe getting everyone vaccinated is not political. It's a public safety issue. Yes, I can understand that politicians can be influenced. ... The billions being made by the corporations producing the vaccine are a pittance in comparison to all the negative consequences of letting it spread uncontrolled.
You seem to be saying, it's not political, but it's political.
Maybe what you mean is that, while there are political aspects to the issues and strong political influences, there are other aspects of greater importance that ought to be considered over all other factors.
But how the decision ought to be made is not the matter at hand; we don't live in an ideal world where all of our leaders and experts are unbiased and altruistic. The matter in question is how the decisions are being made, i.e. to what extent politics has and does influence the decisions being made.
And as far as I can tell, recent history has shown that politics has had a tremendous influence on these policies at every level. For just one example, the confession by a former CDC doctor about how the guideline for distance between people in public places was decided on: someone thought that 10 feet seemed like a a good number, but someone else thought it was impractical, so they compromised and came up with 6 feet--but neither number was scientifically sound (e.g. since the virus is transmitted through aerosols rather than just droplets, it lingers in the air, so there is no distance in an enclosed space which could prevent transmission).
So, given that we know that many of these policies--ones which have wide societal and economic ramifications--have been made on a political basis, the question is, what should we think about these policies, and what should we do about them?
(But I've also heard the transmission rate from children to teachers has been pretty low, but how low?)
There's already a long list of required vaccinations for school... is this one any different?
https://natomasunified.org/immunization-requirements-for-2021-2022-school-year
To me, the answer is a clear Yes. Every vaccine on that list, to my knowledge, results in a much more complete immunity profile than the COVID-19 vaccine. The diseases on that list also impact children in rather devastating ways.
COVID-19 vaccines seem to be more similar to the seasonal flu/cold vaccines than to any of the vaccines on that list. Respiratory diseases circulate around schools every year, and we haven't mandated vaccines for those.
Do we have scientific models showing clear benefits for mandated COVID-19 vaccines for school-age children?
I'm only asking for models here. Is the CA legislation based on scientific models showing that mandating COVID-19 vaccinations for all school-aged children will meaningfully impact health outcomes at the society level? Or is it motivated by a desire to overcome COVID by all means necessary, even ineffective ones?
I have a relative (not a teacher) who can no longer have vaccines due to Guillain-Barré and another friend's relative currently intubated in the hospital with a single J&J shot (no booster unfortunately.)
Kids while not very vulnerable seem to be a carrier into the home.
I don't believe mandated student vaccines is enough for these people (or for the parents of vulnerable students). Instead, we have to do the hard work of allowing appropriate accommodations for high risk individuals. Unfortunately, vaccine or not, much of the responsibility for derisking will inevitably fall to vulnerable individuals themselves, ideally with as much societal support and backing as possible (e.g., plexiglass enclosures for vulnerable employees? I'm not the expert here).
Nothing else we've done so far seems to move the needle much. The stakes aren't personally high enough for everyone else in society to maintain the necessary vigilance for years on end.
Does it? Isn't it well established now that getting the vaccine does not protect infection, only the severity of the disease. If teachers want to protect themselves, then they should get the vaccine.
I personally know a J&J vaccine recipient (but no booster) who is currently intubated. I know someone else who had Guillain-Barré from Covid (who had been vaccinated) and can no longer get vaccines.
These aren't hypotheticals...
I would imagine it’s pretty damn low. I have two kids in daycare, and except for a few weeks early on in the pandemic, their daycare has been open the whole time. Before even, y’know, the vaccine. I dare say daycare workers who change diapers, play closely with toddlers, wipe away bodily fluids, etc. come in far closer contact with children than the average K-12 teacher. And in the whole time we’ve had two of the daycare teachers come down with Covid, based on contract tracing from family members. I think teachers are seriously milking this whole situation to stay home.
As sibling comment says, large indoor gatherings were also not allowed.
This was back when we knew next to nothing about COVID. We didn't know yet what was safe or not. We didn't know if it was transmitted via the air or via touch. We didn't know what was safe, and what was not. Hindsight is 20:20...
Indoor gatherings were banned. But going to the mall wearing a bandana was allowed. And it was much more likely to transmit COVID than sitting outside at the beach.
No, that's post-hoc rationalization. SARS-CoV2 is a coronavirus. After all was said and done...it behaves pretty much like other coronaviruses. We know a lot about coronaviruses, and did back then, as well: they're seasonal; they transmit via the air; they don't transmit readily outside; they're sensitive to heat and light; they don't live long on surfaces; they induce long-lasting B- and T-cell immunity after infection.
Moreover, certain things we knew about SARS-CoV2 from very early on, but completely ignored. The original data out of China, for example, showed that the virus posed miniscule threat to children:
https://twitter.com/BallouxFrancois/status/14853024107844321...
Unfortunately, the use of the word "novel" (which has a specific meaning in the scientific context: it was a new strain) was commonly twisted to interpretations like the GP comment. People heard "novel", assumed the colloquial usage ("totally new!") and leapt to the conclusion that we knew nothing about it. For example, for too long, people were speculating on HN and elsewhere that humans "might not have immunity" to this virus (even though "a virus that doesn't induce immunity" would be perhaps the most extraordinary development in the history of immunology). This was a claim easily debunked, but instead was repeated by some extremely high profile "experts" across the media.
This was a case study in poor scientific communication to the general public, made worse by the fact that the authorities seemed to lean into it, instead of calming the panic. Certain "medical experts", when confronted with uncertainty and doubt, didn't emphasize the things we do know, and instead retreated back to their standard mode of equivocating about any direct question. Meanwhile, a less-ethical group, seeing an obvious opportunity to advance their flagging careers, wildly exaggerated their claims. It was a perfect storm, and to this day, the general public has a complete misunderstanding of the virus and the risks posed by it.
I don't know about that but the paper we had to sign to decide if we wanted to give our kid the vaccine or not was a "beautiful" example of a dark pattern:
"Do you want your kid to get the vaccine? YES / NO. Pick one. Example reason for saying "NO": your kid has some rare medical condition (see with your doctor)"
This was carefully crafted and nasty. Vaccine for kids ain't mandatory yet (at least not in the country where my kid goes to school). I'm 100% sure several parents got tricked into thinking you needed a valid medical reason to answer "NO".
In addition to that, it was made in a hurry: kid came back with the paper in their backpack and you had 48 hours to answer, leaving many parents without any time to think / talk about it.
FWIW I know several doctor friends who are fully vaccinated, who fought in ICUs during the previous waves, including one who got three shots already (he showed me his "covid pass", which contains a counter with the number of shots), and who totally refuse to give their kids the vaccine.
I really don't see the point if you have an healthy kid, knowing that vaccinated people do still catch and transmit the virus. The interests of whom are served by vaccinating an healthy kid?
I don't know how it was implemented elsewhere, but in San Diego county it was forbidden to stay (or sit, or lay) on the beach, while walking and jogging was allowed. Lifeguards were tasked with harassing an occasional sunbather to get moving.
The only point of this headline is for people that aren't in California to be presented with an article that matches what they already think about California.
If it helps you to know, even in vaccine-passport municipalities most people are laughing at this, while they momentarily put on a cloth mask (that's useless against the omicron variant as nobody has n95's) at a crowded bar just to pass through the door.
and for the others that had no idea life has been back to normal for quite some time, if you're in an at-risk population we are absolutely not in this together. its a completely parallel world.
https://www.politico.com/news/2021/10/26/fda-panel-endorses-...
"I'm just worried that if we say yes that the states are going to mandate administration of this vaccine to children in order to go to school, and I do not agree with that," he added. "I think that would be an error at this time until we get more information about the safety.”
Mandating a vaccine that is useless to a group of the population that already don't need the vaccine because they are inherently protected from severe illness and death is 100% anti-science. A "pandemic of bureaucracy" is indeed the correct term for what we are facing today.
Make sure to pick studies that include "mortality by age" since we are discussing children not 80 year olds.
Seems to me, most provax people parrot info that ignores one of the most important factors, age distribution of deaths. This lack of specificity gives people a skewed perception of reality and makes covid seem more deadly than it is.
You can easily check these claims--scroll back a few weeks in the feeds of @zeynep or @EricTopol on twitter. They cite good data and studies.
For all the furore this is invoking its just a proposal and there are a lot of them that are done just to garner headlines. If we were practical, the only thing this will do is provide itself as proof in a narrative against "crazy" CA and nothing else.
The CDC withheld data about efficacy of natural immunity up until recently, and still won't amend their stance to recognize it as a valid alternative to the vaccines like many other countries have.
Is that not anti-science?
Just because they're experts doesn't mean they're on your side.