Infectious disease epidemiologist Jessica Malaty Rivera, MS explains the risk kids face from COVID-19 and the protection provided by the vaccine.
At this point, the data is abundantly clear that COVID-19 has become a vaccine preventable disease and we can prevent more loss if we have more and more people, including children vaccinated. We know that kids can experience a lot of complications from COVID-19. They can be hospitalized. They can experience MIS-C. They can also experience long COVID, which can have some pretty devastating impact on their organs and their development. And, so, because of that we have this tool in our toolkit to prevent further loss, to prevent further illness among this population. And I think that’s why it’s important to vaccinate this population.