Former Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Scott Gottlieb on Sunday predicted that 10 million kids would be vaccinated against the coronavirus before fall if the Pfizer vaccine is authorized for use on younger teens.
During an appearance on CBS’s “Face The Nation,” Gottlieb, who sits on Pfizer’s board of directors, told host John Dickerson he thinks as many as 5 million children between the ages of 12 and 15 will immediately get vaccinated once the company’s vaccine is approved for the age group, with another 5 million to 7 million gradually being vaccinated before the start of the next school year.
“Look, I’m hopeful that the FDA is going to authorize the Pfizer vaccine, the company I’m on the board of, [which] has applied for permission to start giving its vaccine to 12- to 15-year-olds,” Gottlieb told Dickerson. “I’m hopeful the FDA is going to authorize that in a very short time period. And I think once that gets authorized, I think you’ll pick up probably 5 million kids [who] will get immediately vaccinated. There’s about 17 million children between the age of 12 and 15. I think we’ll pick up about 5 million immediately. I think probably another 5 million, 5 [million] to 7 million, would get vaccinated over the course of the summer before the school year.”
He added, “That’ll be incremental, Americans getting vaccinated against COVID and hopefully providing protection in an age group that has been susceptible to the infection. Older kids are more susceptible, certainly, than younger kids.”
Gottlieb also told Dickerson that while vaccine sites and pharmacies will likely begin to offer vaccines to children, pediatricians will be key to getting the age group vaccinated.