What parents need to know about Omicron-specific COVID boosters for children 6 months and older

Children as young as 6 months old are now eligible to get the updated Omicron-specific COVID-19 vaccine. The Food and Drug Administration authorized the use of Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna’s bivalent boosters in this younger age group on Dec. 8, just as the country is experiencing a “tripledemic” of COVID, the flu and RSV.

While the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommends that all children 6 months of age and older without contraindications receive COVID-19 vaccinations, the vaccine rates for young children remain low. About 15.2 million children 6 months to 4 years old haven’t yet gotten their first COVID vaccine dose, according to the AAP, which notes that child vaccination rates “vary widely across states, ranging from 2% to 38% receiving their first dose.”

So what do parents need to know about the bivalent boosters for young children? And why are vaccine rates in kids under 5 lagging behind? Here’s what experts say.

For children, who is eligible to receive the Omicron-specific booster?

Children who are 6 months and older are now eligible to receive the bivalent booster. Those ages 6 months through 5 years are only authorized to get the bivalent booster, however, as their first booster dose — two months after completing their first two doses, Dr. Thomas Giordano, professor and chief of infectious diseases at Baylor College of Medicine, tells Yahoo Life.

“For those who received two doses of Moderna, kids 6 months to 5 years old can get a bivalent boost with either Pfizer or Moderna,” Dr. Aaron Milstone, professor of pediatrics at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, tells Yahoo Life.

However, children 6 months to 4 years old who already had their three-dose primary series with the original (not bivalent) Pfizer vaccine aren’t yet eligible for the updated bivalent booster, according to the FDA. Data to determine whether those children should get an updated booster shot will be available in January.

How safe is the booster for young children?

The FDA’s approval of the bivalent booster for children was based on adult data, but experts say the vaccine is safe for children. “The FDA based the decision on the very impressive safety data seen in all of the other age groups that have gotten these vaccines,” explains Giordano. “I understand that may give some parents pause, but these vaccines are incredibly safe. With Omicron making another surge, this tweak in the vaccine components would not give me concern as a parent.”

Milstone says that parents need to weigh the “risks and benefits” of vaccinating their children. “Severe disease has declined since the vaccine was introduced, as have cases of MIS-C in children,” he says, referring to multisystem inflammatory syndrome, a condition linked to the virus that causes COVID-19, in which different body parts, including the heart, lungs and brain, become inflamed. “The vaccine and booster provide children with the best protection possible against current and future variants.”

How important is it for kids to get the booster?

While children are less likely to suffer severe disease from COVID-19, says Giordano, “they can still get sick and can still infect other people in the household. Getting boosted now will help prevent the fortunately relatively rare outcome of the child who has severe disease, and it will also help children miss less school and parents miss less work because the severity of the disease may be lessened.”

Although Giordano notes that there isn’t a lot of research on humans regarding how well the vaccines protect against the latest BQ variants currently in circulation, “the data from test tubes and laboratory studies suggest the protection against severe disease should still be very good.”

Milstone agrees, adding that “data suggest that vaccines and boosters are still protecting against severe disease.”

Why are COVID vaccination rates for young children still low?

Experts say there are several factors affecting vaccination rates in children. “Severe disease is fortunately less common in young children, so some parents may think the need is not that great,” says Giordano. “Some parents think the vaccines might harm the children in the long run. The vaccines for children were also the last approved, and by then some of the enthusiasm for vaccinations had waned, even though the need hadn’t necessarily changed.”

However, Giordano explains that “the potential for short-term harm is very low and there isn’t anything to suggest long-term harm, and the potential for benefit is real. SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID, isn’t going to disappear from humans anytime soon.”

Milstone agrees, saying that the risks of the vaccines are “small but blown out of proportion by fear and misinformation.” From a public health perspective, he says, “the benefits of vaccination outweigh the risk.”

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