FDA’s Independent Vaccine Advisory Broad Meets to Discuss Vaccines in Kids Ages 5-11

The FDA’s independent vaccine advisory board is meeting today to discuss whether the Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine should be administered to children ages 5 to 11. According to former FDA Commissioner and current Pfizer board member Dr. Scott Gottlieb, the company is ready to ship out doses for children as soon as the agency signs off. On Friday, Pfizer released documents on the efficacy of a children’s dose that was 90.7% effective against symptomatic disease in children in that age group. Once the FDA authorizes the vaccine the CDC will discuss it on November 2 and 3 and from there Dr. Rochelle Walensky will sign off on the recommendation.

Gottlieb said  “if pfizer does get the authorization on tuesday from the fda, even before the cdc votes on this on november 2 and 3, they’ll start to ship it into the supply chain.” and added “so, it could be as early as November fourth or fifth, that you can go into some locations and get your child vaccinated.” According to the Academy of Pediatrics, cases of Covid-19 are up among children and represent a quarter of all weekly reported cases in the U.S.