Posted on 10/20/22
| News Source: The Hill
A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) advisory panel voted Thursday to include the COVID-19 vaccine on the list of routine immunizations for adults and children as young as 6 months.
The agency’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) unanimously voted to add the coronavirus shot to the 2023 list, which includes shots for the flu; measles, mumps and rubella; polio; and other inoculations.
The full agency now needs to sign off to make the recommendation official. The CDC doesn’t have to follow the advice of the panel, though it often does. If the CDC endorses the recommendation, the new list would be published in February.
Contrary to claims made on social media and on television, including by Fox News host Tucker Carlson, the recommendation does not mean the CDC is requiring a COVID-19 shot for children. It also does not mean that schools will have to require that students receive the shot before enrolling.
“The CDC guidelines based on public health are there to help inform those decisions, but those are state decisions. And different states make different decisions and nothing about about what CDC did changes that,” said Jen Kates, a senior vice president at the Kaiser Family Foundation.
Instead, the routine vote means the CDC would be recommending people get the shots as a regular part of their vaccinations against common infectious diseases. The vaccine schedule is an important resource for physicians, especially pediatricians, that can help guide them on when it’s best to administer certain vaccines.