DeSantis backtracks on COVID-19 vaccines for children

Governor Ron DeSantis decided to allow health care providers, such as pediatricians and children’s hospitals, to order COVID-19 vaccines from a federal program for children between the ages of six months and 5 years, a change from earlier this week, when he prevented them from ordering the doses in advance, White House officials told McClatchy.

The decision will expand access to pediatric coronavirus vaccines to parents statewide, which, under DeSantis’ previous position, would have been limited to seeking the vaccines at a select number of community health centers and facilities that participate in a federal retail pharmacy program.

The DeSantis administration is aggressively opposed to the idea that its position has changed, and a Florida Department of Health spokesman told McClatchy that it never planned to stop private health providers from ordering doses.

But those private providers were unable to place orders before the CDC’s Tuesday deadline to receive initial doses during the first two weeks of availability. Orders placed on Friday may take up to two weeks to arrive.

“We are encouraged that after Governor DeSantis’ repeated refusals to order COVID-19 vaccines even after all other states had ordered them, the State of Florida is allowing health care providers to order COVID vaccines. -19 for our youngest children,” White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told McClatchy. “We believe it is critical to allow parents everywhere to have the option to have their children vaccinated and to have a conversation with their pediatrician or health care provider.”

“Even though Governor DeSantis has changed course and is now mandating vaccines, we are going to pull all the levers to get pediatricians across Florida to vaccinate as quickly as possible. This is an encouraging first step and we encourage the state to mandate the vaccines for their state and local health departments so that all Florida parents have the opportunity to have their children vaccinated.”

The request for vaccinations

Jeremy Redfern, press secretary for the Florida Department of Health, said that “the fact that the White House is trying to say that we somehow changed our approach is a complete lie.”

“Advance order means prior to emergency use authorization. The emergency use authorization has already been approved, so providers are allowed to order on their own,” he said. “We didn’t pre-order because we didn’t want to be the CDC’s storage unit.”

The administration of President Joe Biden established advance orders for pediatric vaccine doses to ensure timely delivery once the FDA granted emergency use authorization for the vaccines, which occurred on Friday. No doses were released prior to the FDA decision.

As a result of the delay, pediatricians’ offices and children’s hospitals in Florida—the preferred location for pediatric care for millions of parents—will not have access to doses at the same time as the rest of the country.

Over the course of the week, DeSantis administration officials told reporters that COVID-19 posed “virtually zero risks” to children and, contradicting federal public health agencies, asserted that the risks of vaccinating children babies outweighed the benefits.

“Doctors can get them. Hospitals can get them. But there is not going to be any state program that is going to try to vaccinate infants, toddlers and newborns against COVID,” DeSantis said Thursday. “That’s not something we feel is appropriate, so we’re not going to use our resources for that.”

But White House and Department of Health and Human Services officials told McClatchy that Florida officials who were repeatedly pressed about whether to place orders gave no indication as of Thursday that they would open access to local health care providers.

“The bottom line is that parents in Florida are not going to get immunizations for their children when parents in the rest of the country do,” said a public health official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to be candid.

49 states required vaccinations, Florida did not

McClatchy first reported Wednesday that Florida was the only U.S. state that had not ordered COVID-19 vaccines for children under 5, missing a federal government advance order deadline. Public health officials and the Biden administration are warning that parents across the state will have a hard time finding vaccines for their children as a result.

The news sparked a public outcry from the state’s doctors. On Friday morning, a congressional panel set up to oversee the federal response to the coronavirus demanded an explanation from the governor unless he backed down.

On Friday morning, the FDA granted emergency use authorizations for the vaccines, describing its review process as long and vigorous.

“The agency determined that the known and potential benefits of the Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines against COVID-19 outweigh the known and potential risks in the pediatric populations authorized for use of each vaccine,” the FDA said in a statement.

An independent panel advising the CDC is expected to recommend the use of the vaccines over the weekend. The CDC director is likely to approve those recommendations before Sunday. Vaccination could begin Monday across the country.

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