Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker on Wednesday said people aged 12 to 15 years old can begin getting vaccinated with Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine starting this week if a key federal committee approves its use for that age group.
Baker said during a press conference at Moderna’s Norwood facility that, pending approval, some 400,000 residents in the age group would be able to make appointments for Pfizer vaccine shots or visit walk-in clinics starting Thursday.
A key CDC advisory panel is scheduled to vote Wednesday on whether to recommend the vaccine’s use for kids in that age group. States could begin administering shots in adolescents on Thursday.
The expected vote comes after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration late Monday cleared Pfizer’s vaccine for use among those between 12 and 15 years old.
Saying the vaccine had already proven to be “enormously effective,” Baker said his administration was focused of encouraging as many families to have their children vaccinated.
“What we’re really focused on at this point is making sure that the information we get out to the pediatric community and the primary care community, as well as many of the folks who are part of our vaccination network… is to support people signing up,” he said.
“What we really want to do is make sure we really get as many people who are eligible to get vaccinated, vaccinated.”
He said the state’s vaccination system, including mass vaccination sites, regional collaboratives and pharmacies, would be able to provide enough doses to meet demand for the age group. He said he also believed primary care physicians and pediatricians would play a significant role in such vaccinations.
Baker also announced his administration will launch an employer vaccination program which will allow Massachusetts companies to book appointment blocks at mass vaccination sites or to request mobile vaccine clinics for on-site vaccinations.
During his remarks after touring the Moderna facility, Baker repeatedly praised the firm’s role in fighting the pandemic.
Moderna CEO Stephane Bancel joined the governor to tour lab facilities. They were joined by Moderna Therapeutics Head of Manufacturing Science & Technology Paul Chen and Senior Vice President of U.S. Manufacturing Scott Nickerson. Lt. Gov. Karyn Polito and Secretary of Health and Human Services Marylou Sudders, who has been leading the state’s response to the pandemic, will also be on hand and a vaccination update is planned as part of the 10:30 a.m. event.
On Tuesday, Baker praised the state’s COVID-19 vaccine push during a meeting with other governors and President Joe Biden, saying the state’s “mixed model” of vaccine distribution helped ensure a broad base of Massachusetts residents received shots.
“Our program was basically what I refer to as a mixed model,” Baker said. “Our mass vaccination sites did about a million shots but we also had regional collaboratives with local boards of health and local providers in areas where we had a lot of geography between and among people.”
The state also prioritized getting shots into the arms of the state’s more vulnerable populations, the Republican said.
“We’ve managed to successfully vaccinate so far our Hispanic community, our Asian community, our Black community in rates that are right up there with our white community,” Baker told Biden. “We still have some work to do there but we’ve made a lot of progress.”
Not everyone was ready to give Baker high marks.
Activists say that while Massachusetts has made rapid progress on overall rates of vaccination, persistent racial disparities in vaccination remain and illustrate a lack of equity in the rollout process.
“While Governor Baker is touting Massachusetts’ progress on vaccine distribution, racial disparities have persisted since the beginning of the vaccine program and remain a major concern,” said Vaccine Equity Now! Coalition Co-Chairs Dr. Atyia Martin of the Resilient 21 Coalition, Eva Millona of the Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy Coalition, and Carlene Pavlos of the Massachusetts Public Health Association.
They said vaccination rates among communities of color remain below the rate of the white population, even though those communities have been disproportionately impacted by COVID-19 hospitalization.
While 55% of white residents have received at least one dose of the vaccine, only 33% of Hispanic residents, 37% of Black residents, and 53% of Asian residents have received at least one dose, according to the latest weekly COVID-19 vaccination report.
“If reaching the communities that have been hardest hit by the pandemic and ensuring equitable access to the vaccine was truly a top priority for the Baker administration, it would have invested in these community-based sites proven to reduce inequities from the outset of the program,” the three said in a press release Tuesday.
If adults don’t have to wear masks outdoors while remaining socially distanced, why do kids have to, some Massachusetts parents are wondering.
Also on Tuesday, state health officials released some positive pandemic numbers, with the state reporting no new COVID-19-related deaths and the number of residents fully vaccinated against the disease topping 3 million.
The number of new daily cases of COVID-19 increased by about 470.
With no new deaths, the state’s confirmed COVID-19 death toll remained at 17,344 since the start of the pandemic, while its confirmed caseload rose to about 654,000.
