COVID-19 vaccine approved for children 5 to 11 years old

At the local level, officials are working on plans for vaccination clinics for the new age group. It was not known on Friday how many doses for children – which are a third of the doses for the elderly – the North Olympic Peninsula will receive in the first week, and parents should prepare for possible shortages of these vaccines during the first week or so. vaccinations, said Dr Allison Berry, health worker for Jefferson and Clallam counties.

In response to a question from a viewer of his Friday morning briefing in County Clallam, Berry explained that no children had died from the Pfizer vaccine, while more than 600 children have died across the country. country of the new coronavirus.

No children have died from COVID-19 on the peninsula.

Berry recommends that parents get their children vaccinated against COVID-19 as soon as possible once approved, saying it is a safe and effective vaccine and that she will get her own daughter vaccinated once she is enough aged.

As of February, about 74% of new COVID-19 cases in Jefferson County have been confirmed among unvaccinated residents. In Clallam County, 83% of new cases since February have been in unvaccinated residents, according to public health data from Berry and the county.

According to the latest data from the state Department of Health, 80.5% of the population aged 12 and over in Jefferson County have started getting vaccinated, with 76.8% fully vaccinated.

Of the population as a whole, 74 percent have started immunization and 70.7 percent are fully immunized, according to the state scoreboard.

In Clallam County, 74.3 percent of the population aged 12 and over have started to be vaccinated, of which 69.7 percent are fully vaccinated.

Of the total population, 66% have started vaccinations, with 61.9% fully vaccinated, according to the state dashboard.

A common misinformation regarding vaccines is that people who are vaccinated are just as likely to contract COVID-19 as those who are not, and that is completely wrong, Berry said.

“If you had the same probability of getting it, the percentage of people vaccinated positive would be the same percentage as people who were fully vaccinated in our community,” Berry said. “So in Jefferson, 70% of the population is fully vaccinated.

“If this did not affect transmission at all, you would expect 70 percent of our new cases to be among fully vaccinated residents, which matches the numbers in the population; but, we see the opposite of that.

New cases

Clallam County added 38 new cases of COVID-19 on Friday, bringing its total to 4,873 since the start of the pandemic, according to county public health data.

Jefferson County confirmed five new cases on Friday, bringing its total to 1,148 since the start of the pandemic, according to county public health data.

Clallam County has recorded a rate of 329 cases per 100,000 population in the last two weeks as of Friday, remaining in the low plateau of 300 where it was this week, according to public health data.

Jefferson County’s case rate declined slightly to 250.78 per 100,000 for the two weeks preceding October 27. Prior to that, the case rate was 253.92 per 100,000 for the two weeks leading up to Oct. 20, according to public health data.

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Jefferson County reporter Zach Jablonski can be reached at 360-385-2335, ext. 5, or at [email protected]