Israel to start vaccinating children aged between 5 and 12 years from next week

After announcing booster vaccine shots, Israel has now said that it will start inoculating kids as young a five years old. In its latest announcement, the country’s health ministry said that they will begin their vaccination campaign for children between the ages of 5 and 12 years starting next week. A mild dose of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine would be used for immunisation purpose. 

As per a report by the Times of Israel, the jabs which would be one-third the size of an adult dose and will be arriving in the country latest by Thursday. As of now, no particular instructions have been given to medical teams regarding the same, but a report by Ynet suggests that country’s vaccination committee will meet on November 17 to finalise the gap between the two doses. According to FDA, the recommended gap between two vaccine shots is three weeks. 

Over 6 million people vaccinated in Israel

According to the official data by the Israel health ministry, as many as 6,257,947 people have received the first dose of vaccines while 5,754,736 have been fully vaccinated. In addendum, 4,021,415 people have received a third, booster shot. On Wednesday, the Health ministry okayed vaccination for children, almost a week after US regulators approved the same. 

On November 3, the team belonging to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) deliberated upon the same, discussing at length whether the jabs would be beneficial to all 28 million children in the country. A final recommendation from the American health body came hours after, giving a final clearance to the Pfizer/BioNTech shots. 

At an earlier press briefing, White House coronavirus response coordinator Jeff Zients announced that all children belonging to the age group between 5 to 11 years will be able to receive Pfizer/BioNTech doses at paediatrician offices, medical clinics, pharmacies and community health centres. Without revealing a particular timeline for the same, he said the inoculation program would be running at full length. “There’s plenty of supply of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine and we look forward to parents having the opportunity to vaccinate their kids,” he told reporters.

Image: AP