The US President Joe Biden has set a new vaccination goal to deliver at least one shot to 70 per cent of adult Americans by July 4.
The US is tackling the vexing problem of winning over the doubters and those unmotivated to get inoculated.
Our goal by July 4th is to have 70% of adult Americans with at least one shot — and 160 million Americans fully vaccinated. It’s another huge goal, and a serious step toward a return to normal.
Get vaccinated, keep following CDC guidance. We can do this.
— President Biden (@POTUS) May 4, 2021
The US also plans to roll out the shots for 12- to 15-year-olds as soon as possible.
In the meanwhile, the US Food and Drug Administration is weighing whether to approve the Pfizer vaccine for children as young as 12.
Pfizer’s vaccine is currently approved in the US for people as young as 16.
Mr Biden said he would not interfere with the FDA process but “if that announcement comes, we are ready to move immediately”.
Joe Biden has also said that the vaccines will be sent directly to paediatricians in the following weeks. He added that parents and their children can talk to their family doctor about it and get the shot from the provider they trust the most.
He added that 15,000 pharmacies would also be made available to teenagers to get their jab.”
Additionally, the US has also announced a new website, vaccines.gov, that Americans can use to more easily find vaccination sites after widespread complaints.
Ongoing Trials On Children by Pfizer
The landmark Pfizer-BioNTech Phase 3 clinical trial began in late July 2020, recruiting participants aged 12 and over. Close to three thousand participants were adolescents: 2,259 participants were between the ages of 12-15 and 754 participants were 16 and 17 years old. In March 2021, Pfizer and BioNTech dosed the first healthy children in a global Phase 1/2/3 continuous study to learn if the vaccine can produce an immune response against COVID-19, and if it is safe, in children aged 6 months to 11 years.
(With agency inputs & https://www.pfizer.com/)