Fewer than 1 in 5 US parents say they’ll get COVID-19 vaccines for kids under 5 as soon as they can, survey finds

By Virginia Langmaid, CNN

US children under 5 are getting closer to authorized COVID-19 vaccines, but most parents may be reluctant to actually get them when they become available, a new survey found.

According to the Kaiser Family Foundation’s Vaccine Monitor survey, published Wednesday, only 18% of parents of children under 5 said they would vaccinate their child against COVID-19 as soon as a vaccine was available.

Nearly 40% of parents of young children said they would “wait and see” before vaccinating their child, 11% said they would get the vaccine only if required, and 27% said they would “definitely not” vaccinate their child against COVID-19.

More than half of parents in this age group said they “don’t have enough information about the safety and effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines for children in this age group,” compared with 34% of parents of children ages 5-11 and 25% of parents of children ages 12-17. About 13% of parents of young children said the US Food and Drug Administration’s delay in authorizing a vaccine in this age group made them less confident about its safety, and 22% said it made them more confident.

There were similar findings among parents of older children. For the 5 to 11 age group, 39% of parents said their children were vaccinated, and 32% said their children would definitely not be vaccinated. Among parents of children 12 to 17, 56% said their kids had been vaccinated, and 31% said they definitely will not have their children vaccinated.

A majority of parents who took part in the survey also said they felt that their child was at least somewhat safe from COVID-19 while at school, but the answers varied by race.

More than 80% of parents surveyed said their child was very or somewhat safe in school. However, only a third of Black or Hispanic parents said they felt that their child was very safe, compared with 52% of White parents.

The survey found a “large shift” in school mask requirements, with the percentage of parents who said that their child was required to wear a mask at school falling from 69% in September to 16% in April.

“Parents who are Black or Hispanic are more than twice as likely as White parents to say their child usually wears a mask (70% vs. 26%) and five times as likely to say that most other students at their child’s school wear masks (9% vs. 47%),” the report authors wrote.

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