Avula: Children 12 and older may have opportunity to be vaccinated at school in May, June

Virginia students 12 and older might have the chance to receive COVID-19 vaccinations in their schools before the school year ends in June.

That’s according to state vaccination coordinator Danny Avula, who said during a call with state media members Friday that he and other officials will be meeting with the state’s school superintendents next week to discuss the possibility.

Emergency use authorization that would permit the Pfizer vaccine to be administered to children and teens 12 to 16 is expected as soon as mid-May, according to Avula. That same authorization could come shortly thereafter for the Moderna vaccine, he said.

Students would need parental permission in order to receive a vaccine. (Vaccines are not expected to be approved for children between the ages of 2 and 11 until early 2022, Avula said.)

The concept is one of many being weighed by state officials, Avula said, as they move into a new – and more challenging – phase of the vaccination process. There are only perhaps a few thousand people statewide remaining on pre-registration lists who have not yet been offered vaccinations, Avula said, meaning that almost everyone in the state who is eligible for a vaccine and who wanted to get one as soon as possible now has had that opportunity.

To date, about 44% of all Virginians and about 57% of those 16 and older – the group currently eligible to be vaccinated – have received at least one dose, Avula said.

But now officials must determine the best ways to reach about another 30% of all state residents in order to reach their designated herd immunity threshold of 75% of the state’s population.

Offering vaccinations in schools could help reach what Avula termed a "large segment" of the state's population and could also have encouraging secondary effects, such as perhaps helping to encourage hesitant parents to be vaccinated, too.

Vaccination efforts 'pivoting'

Overall, though, just vaccinating another 10% to 15% of eligible Virginians could take another three to four months, Avula said, because of how diligently officials at the state and local levels will need to work with partners to reach people who are hesitant about the vaccine or who simply haven’t viewed it as a priority yet.

To help, the state has enlisted VCU officials, who are currently conducting a survey of Virginians to learn more about those who have not chosen to be vaccinated yet and what hesitancies they might have, Avula said Friday. Results are expected within several weeks.

Avula believes there is a significant chunk of residents who aren’t necessarily hesitant about the vaccine itself but rather haven’t prioritized getting vaccinated, haven’t been able to navigate pre-registration or registration efforts online or by phone, or simply haven’t wanted to travel to large mass vaccination sites to get their shots.

As efforts move to more localized vaccination settings, he is hopeful many of those people will get vaccinated.

In the meantime, Avula and his team are planning to allocate higher percentages of the state’s vaccine doses to primary care providers, in the hope that a number of residents will be more comfortable receiving a vaccine from their own doctors.

“We are pivoting all over Virginia in a different direction to make vaccination as convenient as possible,” he said. “Studies show it’s your primary care providers who you trust.”

State health officials – who for the past few months have been telling providers who receive vaccine doses that they need to use them within one week – now will change their messaging, Avula said, to indicate that doses may be stored for several weeks if necessary as long as they are used by their expiration dates. That should help smaller medical offices feel comfortable requesting doses, he said.

State officials also are working with local health districts to arrange for those offices to store doses for one or several weeks that can be used to replenish supplies at partner provider locations, Avula said.

Younger people are key in vaccination process

In addition to proactive efforts to reach people who may be generally hesitant about being vaccinated and groups of minorities, state health officials also will focus on a particularly key segment of the population: people 16 to 39, Avula said.

Many people in that age range may not view vaccination as a critical issue, he said, since they are less likely to experience significant effects from the virus if they get it. More than one-third of all documented COVID-19 cases in Virginia have occurred in people in their 20s and 30s, but those same age groups account for just less than one-quarter of all vaccinations in the state.

Those numbers are important, because younger people tend to be more active in the community and more likely to transmit the virus if they’re not vaccinated.

Avula said he’s pleased with the state’s success rate of vaccinating Black and Latino residents; Blacks account for about 19% of the state’s population and about 14% of those vaccinated so far, while Latinos account for just shy of 10% of the state’s population but more than 11% of those vaccinated.

Another topic state officials are analyzing: the percentage of people who received a first dose of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines but did not return for a second dose within the six-week window urged by the Centers for Disease Control. There are about 160,000 people statewide – about 9.4% of all those vaccinated in Virginia – who fall into that category, Avula said.