Politics

Healthy Kids Should Not Get Vaccinated For COVID-19, Florida’s Surgeon General Announces As State Policy

[Twitter/Screenshot/Chris Nelson]

Brianna Lyman News and Commentary Writer
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The Florida Department of Health announced Monday that healthy children should not get the coronavirus vaccine.

Florida Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo made the announcement Monday, noting the state is the first in the nation to officially advise the opposite of what the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends. The CDC advises children five and older get vaccinated against COVID-19.

Ladapo cited a study recently released by the New York State Department of Health that showed the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine’s protection for preventing hospitalization in kids between five and 11 years old went from 100% to 48% over roughly six weeks during the Omicron surge, according to WPTV.

The study, which has not been peer-reviewed yet, also found the vaccine’s efficacy rate for preventing infection fell to 12% from 68%. (RELATED: FDA Postpones Possible Authorization Of Vaccines For Kids Under 5)

“We’re kind of scraping at the bottom of the barrel — particularly with healthy kids — in terms of actually being able to quantify with any accuracy and any confidence the even potential of benefit,” Ladapo reportedly said regarding the vaccine’s efficacy.

Florida Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried, a Democratic challenger to Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, said Ladapo’s remarks are “dangerous COVID-19 misinformation,” according to WPTV.

“I urge all Floridians to follow the COVID-19 guidance provided by their doctors, in addition to the FDA and the CDC, and not the anti-science conspiracy theories DeSantis and Ladapo are pushing.”

Forty-two children in Florida under the age of 16 have died from COVID-19 out of more than 804,000 cases, the Tampa Bay Times reported, citing state data.

Ladapo has been outspoken against other CDC recommendations, saying in October that there was a “substantial gap between the quality of the data out there supporting masking kids yielding any benefit for kids whatsoever, factual, and what we’re hearing from some of our public health leadership in other states and nationally.”