Vacid Vacid for elementary school children likely to arrive in 2022

School-age children are likely to be able to receive Covid-19 vaccines early next year, predicted Dr. Anthony Fauci on NBC’s “Meet the Press” program on Sunday.

Fauci, the government’s top epidemiologist, said there are already studies underway to study the safety of the vaccine for young children.

“If you project realistically, when will we be able to get enough data to say that elementary school children can be vaccinated, I think it would be at least at the end of the year, and most likely in the first quarter of 2022”, said Fauci.

Federal regulators have approved three Covid-19 vaccines to help fight the pandemic. Two vaccines, those manufactured by Johnson & Johnson and Moderna, are approved for adults aged 18 and over.

The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine can be administered to people aged 16 and over, although at present eligibility for young people is strictly restricted to those who meet certain criteria, such as underlying medical conditions.

Vaccinating children can help states and localities to open schools and return to face-to-face education safely. Fewer children than adults became ill with Covid-19, but they can still contract the virus, become seriously ill and pass it on to others, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Fauci said high school students are likely to be able to get vaccinations at the beginning of the school year in the fall.

“I’m not sure if it is exactly on the first day of school, but very close to it,” he said.

To date, more than 72 million doses of the vaccine have been administered in the United States, according to CDC data. About one in five adults received at least one dose and about one in 10 adults received two.

The Johnson & Johnson single-dose vaccine was approved for emergency use by the Food and Drug Administration on Saturday, and is expected to accelerate the campaign to inoculate all Americans. The federal government plans to distribute four million doses next week.