Dr Kierzek: “Vaccinating all children against Covid-19 makes no sense!”

in collaboration with

Dr Gérald Kierzek (Medical Director of Doctissimo)

Returning to its position of a few months ago when it was cautious on the question of the vaccination of children against Covid-19, the Academy of Medicine published a press release on January 25 to on the contrary “hasten” the process.

The highly contagious Omicron variant

She puts forward several elements for this:3 times greater transmissibility” of the Omicron variant compared to “to that of the Delta variant and a lower virulence“, but also “the high incidence of contamination in children” for two months, in a “context favorable to transmission in schools and families”. The Academy of Medicine also recalls “the 979 children hospitalized in France and the 9 deaths that have occurred since the beginning of 2022″, distinguished between hospitalizations “for” or “with” Covid. Finally, the press release evokes the individual and collective benefits of vaccination before deploring the too low number of children vaccinated to date.

All these elements are now pushing the institution to change its tune and to recommend “accelerating” the vaccination of all children aged 5 to 11, with or without comorbidities. She puts forward several avenues for this, such as “increase the offer of vaccination” or “diversify the personnel” authorized to do so.

“No interest in healthy children”

Dr. Alice Desbiolles, public health doctor and epidemiologist recalled on her Twitter account by taking up the press release from the Academy of Medicine that Public Health France had indicated that the nine children who died were not because of Covid. “IThese were children who were infected but died of something else or had serious comorbidities“ she indicates.

Asked about the question, Dr Gérald Kierzek explains that “Vaccinating all children makes no sense”. “The benefit-risk balance leans in favor of the benefit for children with comorbidities. For the others, there is no interest in having them vaccinated. On the contrary, children have little risk of developing serious forms and are in the process of acquiring a natural immunity which is better than that acquired by vaccination..

“Furthermore, there is no significant decrease in carriage and contamination by children with the vaccine, as evidenced by a recent Lancet study” says Dr. Kierzek.

Soon the under 5s in the United States?

In the United States, the discourse is quite different. White House chief medical adviser Anthony Fauci suggested that children under the age of 4 “should receive their three doses” during a press point held on January 26 at the White House. Remember that for the moment, in France, there is no obligation to have children aged 5 to 11 vaccinated against Covid-19.

Sweden says no to vaccination of 5-11 year olds

On January 27, 2022, the Swedish health authorities decided not to recommend anti-covid vaccination for 5-11 year olds. According to them, only children at risk can benefit from it. In comments reported by Le Parisien, Britta Björklund, in charge of this file at the Swedish Public Health Authority, said: “The vaccines are safe, they are very good vaccines, but we are focusing on the medical benefits of the individual child and we do not believe the benefits are great enough to recommend vaccination of the whole group.”.