![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
In an elementary school my 7yo son is attending they plan to start vaccinations ASAP and mandate them.
So I carefully reviewed official data from the FDA advisory board meeting and vote.
I don't doubt effectiveness of the vaccine. FDA board members are professionals so I'll just rely on their data. For 10000 vaccinations 2.0 covid hospitalizations are going to be prevented. (Assuming incidence rate grows a bit comparing to September peak. But so far it only went down). Also this is an average for the whole set of 6-11 year olds, for a healthy 7yo odds should be a bit smaller.
Safety data is more interesting. Regarding the most important concern, they estimate 1.5 pericarditis/myocarditis hospitalizations per 10000 5-11yo boys. Risk for girls is ~0.1x of that so vaccination would make sense. As 1.5 and 2.0 are averages, their respective CIs may actually overlap.
Why then they voted yes 17/18? Dr. Eric Rubies, a voting member, summarised: “It should be a personal choice. If I had a child who is a transplant recipient, I would really want to be able to use the vaccine. …. We are worried about side effects we can’t measure yet. … But we are not going to learn how safe this vaccine is [for children 5-11] unless we start giving it. That’s just the way it goes. That is how we found out about rare complications of other vaccines, so I think we should approve it. ”
Almost every voting member acknowledged before the vote that this decision is a very close call. However after they voted, the tone instantly changed to being 100% confident, as quoted by CNN and likes.
So I carefully reviewed official data from the FDA advisory board meeting and vote.
I don't doubt effectiveness of the vaccine. FDA board members are professionals so I'll just rely on their data. For 10000 vaccinations 2.0 covid hospitalizations are going to be prevented. (Assuming incidence rate grows a bit comparing to September peak. But so far it only went down). Also this is an average for the whole set of 6-11 year olds, for a healthy 7yo odds should be a bit smaller.
Safety data is more interesting. Regarding the most important concern, they estimate 1.5 pericarditis/myocarditis hospitalizations per 10000 5-11yo boys. Risk for girls is ~0.1x of that so vaccination would make sense. As 1.5 and 2.0 are averages, their respective CIs may actually overlap.
Why then they voted yes 17/18? Dr. Eric Rubies, a voting member, summarised: “It should be a personal choice. If I had a child who is a transplant recipient, I would really want to be able to use the vaccine. …. We are worried about side effects we can’t measure yet. … But we are not going to learn how safe this vaccine is [for children 5-11] unless we start giving it. That’s just the way it goes. That is how we found out about rare complications of other vaccines, so I think we should approve it. ”
Almost every voting member acknowledged before the vote that this decision is a very close call. However after they voted, the tone instantly changed to being 100% confident, as quoted by CNN and likes.
