COVID, Why the Rush to Vaccinate Healthy Children? (Updated, Oct. 16, 2021)

By Vern Saboe, Jr

Pfizer announced it has applied to the FDA to gain emergency use authorization (EUA) for their experimental mRNA COVID-19 vaccine for 5-11-year-old children, experimental because mRNA vaccines have never been tried on humans outside of limited clinical trials, there is no commercial experience with mRNA vaccines and the current experiment continues. The Moderna/NIH clinical trial does not end until Oct. 27, 2022, and the Pfizer/BioNTech clinical trial does not end until Jan. 31, 2023. The first attempt at a COVID mRNA vaccine was in 2012 for the SARS COVID virus. Though initially the vaccine increased levels of COVID antibodies, it was later shown in animal testing the animals died when re-exposed to COVID due to hypersensitivity to COVID that developed, the SARS vaccine program was promptly cancelled[i] According to John Ioannidis, MD, Professor of Medicine, Epidemiology and Population Health, and Biomedical Data Science at Stanford University, the infection survival rate for 2-11-year-old children is 99.9973%. Essentially, normal healthy children are oblivious to the coronavirus with nearly a zero chance of dying from COVID-19, so where is the emergency?

For a coronavirus to infect a human cell, their spike proteins must attach to ACE2 receptors on the surface of the human cell and since children’s nasal epithelium have less ACE 2 receptors, this results in young children being less likely to be infected. This is also in part why children are poor spreaders of the infection to other children or adults and why they tend not to have severe illness.[ii] [iii]Research also reveals children have pre-activated antiviral innate immunity in their upper airways that work to further control early SARS-CoV-2 infection. Children’s airway immune cells are apparently primed for virus sensing, resulting in a robust early innated antiviral response to SARS-CoV-2 infection.[iv]

Natural immunity is more robust, broad, more adaptive, and longer lasting than the pseudo-immunity induced by current experimental Covid-19 injections.[v] Multiple studies have revealed that natural immunity even after mild Covid infection, is robust, broad, more adaptive, and longer lasting. Part of a child’s and adolescent’s natural immunity to Covid-19 is their prior exposure to other coronaviruses including those that cause the “common cold," and this occurs even between very different coronaviruses.[vi][vii] This is in part why the unvaccinated population’s immune system can adapt to the Covid-19 variants rendering them less of a concern.[viii] To quote these investigators: “Consistent with reported serology, pre-pandemic children had class-switched convergent clones to severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 with weak cross-reactivity to other coronaviruses…these results highlight the prominence of early childhood B cell clonal expansions and cross-reactivity for future responses to novel pathogens." There is also evidence suggesting children and adolescents far less susceptible or likely transmitters of Covid-19, are not “super spreaders" and do not pose a significant health risk to their adult schoolteachers.[ix] [x][xi][xii] [xiii]

A recent article entitled, “Why are we vaccinating children against Covid-19?"[xiv] The authors note, “A novel best-case scenario cost-benefit analysis showed very conservatively that there are five times the number of deaths attributable to each inoculation (vaccine) vs. those attributable to COVID-19 in the most vulnerable 65+ age demographic. The risk of death from COVID-19 drops drastically as age decreases, increasing the risk while reducing the benefit for our children." In his June 10, 2021, opinion article, Marty Makary, MD, MPH professor at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Bloomberg School of Public Health, and Editor-in-Chief of MedPage Today stated, “Think Twice Before Giving the COVID Vax to Healthy Kids."[xv] Dr. Makary notes, “I am not aware of a single healthy child in the US who has died of COVID-19 to date." Dr. Markary and his team make a valid case for vaccinating children with pre-existing health issues placing them at higher risk. “We found that 100% of pediatric COVID-19 deaths were in children with a pre-existing condition, solidifying the case to vaccinate a child with a co-morbidity." Professors in pediatrics, Richard Mahey (Harvard) and Adam Finn (Univ. of Bristol) opine, “As pediatricians we say please don’t use precious coronavirus vaccines on healthy children, healthy children are at little risk of severe disease from Covid."[xvi] “COVID-19 severity in children under the age of 12 is similar to that of influenza," says researcher Jennie Lavine, Dept. of Biology, Emory University, Atlanta, and professors Rustom Antia and Ottar Bjornstad, Dept. Biology, Center for Infectious Disease Dynamics Penn State Univ.[xvii]

The Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine clinical trial found the overall incidence of severe adverse events during the two-month observation period to be nearly double the risk to subjects who did not receive the vaccine.[xviii] Reports of rare serious side effects, for example myocarditis and pericarditis, a few days following one of the mRNA COVID vaccines in children and adolescents is a growing concern.[xix] [xx] [xxi] Most individuals with myocarditis do not have symptoms. Complications of myocarditis include dilated cardiomyopathy, arrhythmias, sudden cardiac death, and carries a mortality rate of 20% at one year and 50% at 5 years. Despite optimal medical management, overall mortality has not changed in the last 30 years.[xxii]

Physicians at medical institutions in the US and around the world are calling for far more cost-benefit analysis of COVID-19 vaccines for low-risk populations such as healthy children and adolescents. In their

June 1, 2021, “Citizen Petition" to the FDA, professors from Oregon Health and Sciences University, UCLA, Harvard, Texas A&M, and 21 other institutions in part, recommended prior to the FDA granting a license to any COVID-19 vaccine, “…that there is substantial evidence of clinical effectiveness that outweighs harms in special populations such as: infants, children, and adolescents…" Considering this information, why are we rushing to vaccinate healthy school kids?