Vaccines for Children: List By Age, Benefits, Safety
Drive-thru Vaccination Clinic Offers Pomona-area Patients Protection From Flu
Patients filed into the parking lot at Pomona Valley Hospital Medical Center Saturday morning, Oct. 19, to protect themselves as flu season approaches.
The hospital hosted the drive-thru flu shot clinic a day after Riverside County public health officials announced the first flu-related death in the region. A man in his 70s died earlier in October, health officials said.
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ExpandBetween October 2023 and April 2024, as many as 75 million people got the flu in the U.S., according to estimates from Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, resulting in up to 900,000 hospitalizations and between 17,000 and 100,000 deaths, the Pomona Valley hospital said in a news release.
RELATED: LA County offering free COVID-19 booster shots, critical for fall and winter
Public health officials say vaccinations can prevent flu transmission and reduce the risk of hospitalization, severe illness and death.
It is also an important preventive tool for people with chronic health conditions, such as heart disease and chronic lung disease, health officials say.
Updated COVID-19 Vaccine Now Available Throughout Lincoln
The Lincoln-Lancaster County Health Department announced the updated COVID-19 vaccine is now available through several local pharmacies, health care providers and clinics.
Kerry Kernen, assistant health director, said the Health Department expects an increase in respiratory illnesses, including COVID-19, this fall and winter.
"The virus that causes COVID-19 is always changing and the updated vaccine helps our bodies develop protection against the newest variants that may be circulating in the community," Kernen said.
The Health Department provides the updated COVID-19 vaccine and flu shot for free to adults and children who are uninsured, underinsured or have Medicaid.
Eligible individuals can receive updated COVID-19 and flu vaccines at the Health Department by appointment only. Call 402-441-8065 to schedule an appointment.
The updated COVID-19 vaccine should be covered under most health insurance plans, including Medicare. Insured residents must receive the vaccine through a pharmacy or health care provider instead of the Health Department. Visit vaccines.Gov to check pharmacy locations and availability.
COVID-19 vaccination provides greater protection against illness and hospitalization, according to the CDC.
The CDC recommends the updated COVID-19 vaccine in addition to the flu vaccine for everyone age 6 months and older. The flu vaccine can be given at the same time as the updated COVID-19 vaccine.
Every household can order four free at-home COVID-19 tests through the federal government at covidtests.Gov. COVID-19 tests are also available in the main lobby of the Health Department, 3131 O St, during regular business hours and at all Lincoln City Library locations.
Top Journal Star photos for October 2024Norris' Crew Moeller (4) dives into the endzone over Waverly's Trev Greve (2) to score a touchdown in the second quarter to score a on Friday, Oct. 18, 2024, at Norris High School.
KENNETH FERRIERA Journal StarLincoln North Star junior Skyler Shaw practices welding at The Career Academy. Ten years since its grand opening, The Career Academy at Lincoln Public Schools has more than doubled its enrollment and district officials expect that growth to continue.
JUSTIN WAN, Journal StarFactory Manager Dan Neil (from left), associate maintenance manager Tanner Winberg, predictive maintenance tech Kenny Rose, PDM Tech Chu Fung Wong, and IT tech Gary Schellhorn pose for a photo alongside their new Boston Dynamics robot dog Spot at Nestle Purina Petcare Company on Tuesday, Oct. 15, 2024, in Crete.
KENNETH FERRIERA Journal StarGretna's Alexis Jensen celebrates after the final out of the fifth inning during a Class A state tournament game on Thursday in Hastings.
KENNETH FERRIERA Journal StarOliver Degner, 4, (from left) Charlotte Degner, 6, and Noelle Gormley, 7, all of Lincoln, run to the finish line during the Pumpkin Run on Sunday in Lincoln's Haymarket.
JUSTIN WAN, Journal StarErika Madison, Capital Humane Society animal welfare specialist manager, weighs a Goldendoodle on a scale during intake on Friday. The city of Lincoln is balking at signing a new long-term contract with the humane society to provide shelter for stray animals after the amount nearly tripled over previous years.
KENNETH FERRIERA, Journal StarRuss Marr works on a wooden portion of "Vlad the Impaler" — an art piece depicting a goose that has the fangs of a vampire, the tongue of a serpent and the tail of a rattlesnake. The body of the piece uses an original tank from a 1977 Harley-Davidson Super Glide.
JUSTIN WAN, Journal StarMalcolm's Cole Tiedeman (center) celebrates with his teammates after the Clippers defeated Raymond Central 27-19 on Friday, Oct. 11, 2024, at Raymond Central High School.
KENNETH FERRIERA Journal StarLincoln Northwest High School seniors Brookelynn Wheeler (from left), Tyjian Deerinwater, Kareem Yahya and Haylie Helmick investigate a crime scene during a forensics class on Tuesday.
JUSTIN WAN, Journal StarLincoln Lutheran's McKenzie Sidlo (center from left) goes to hit the ball over the net while defended by Pius X's McKenzie Becker and Faith Venable (2) during the third set on Tuesday, Oct. 8, 2024, at Lincoln Lutheran High School
KENNETH FERRIERA Journal StarAs seen from outside the UNL Union, Sen. Deb Fischer (right) speaks about her responsibilities as a senator and answers questions from students during a UNL College Republicans meeting on Wednesday, Oct. 9, 2024, at the UNL Union. Fischer, the Republican from Nebraska seeking her third term in the US Senate.
KENNETH FERRIERA Journal StarLincoln Southwest's Ja'Sara Wilson kicks up dirt as she slides into second base in the first inning of the A-2 district championship on Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024, at Doris Bair Complex .
KENNETH FERRIERA Journal StarHenry Oetjen augers corn from his combine into a grain cart while harvesting on Monday, Oct. 7, 2024, at Oetjen Farms near Walton.
KATY COWELL Journal StarPius X's Faith Venable (left) is mobbed by her teammates after scoring the set winning kill in the second set on Tuesday, Oct. 8, 2024, at Lincoln Lutheran High School
KENNETH FERRIERA Journal StarFrom left, Nola Broderick, 7, and her twin Rose Broderick ride their bikes past the Halloween decorations at the home of Wade and Debbie McGinnis at 5043 Leighton Avenue is seen on Tuesday, Oct. 1, 2024, in Lincoln.
JUSTIN WAN Journal StarMalcolm players are silhouetted by the sun as they warm up before the game on Friday, Oct. 4, 2024, at Malcolm High School.
KENNETH FERRIERA Journal StarNebraska players huddle up the North endzone in the fourth quarter against Rutgers on Saturday, Oct. 5, 2024, at Memorial Stadium.
KENNETH FERRIERA Journal StarWicked Bones band members Marshall Johnson (left) and Jobe Sullivan rock out onstage during at UNL's Battle of the Bands on Wednesday, Oct. 2, 2024, at the Bourbon Theatre. Six local bands comprised of UNL students competed for a spot to perform as part of UNL's homecoming. The final two bands will perform during Cornstock on Friday.
KENNETH FERRIERA, Journal StarNebraska's Isaac Gifford (2), Nebraska's Ceyair Wright (15), DeShon Singleton (8) and Nebraska's MJ Sherman (48) celebrate a defensive stop during the third quarter of the game against Rutgers on Saturday, Oct. 5, 2024, at Memorial Stadium.
KATY COWELL Journal StarNebraska's Jahmal Banks is defended by Rutgers' Eric Rogers is ruled as a incomplete pass, Saturday, Oct. 5, 2024, at Memorial Stadium.
JUSTIN WAN Journal StarMark Thornton, executive director of Jacob's Well, sees potential in an old grocery store at 2001 J St. He hopes to create a new gather place and make it part of the neighborhood again.
JUSTIN WAN, Journal StarLincoln Southwest's Sage Strait competes in the Girls 5K during the LPS cross country championships at Pioneers Park on Friday, Oct. 4, 2024, in Lincoln.
KENNETH FERRIERA Journal StarNorris' Crew Moeller (4) stiff-arms Lincoln Pius X's Sam Kassmeier during the first quarter on Friday at Aldrich Field.
KATY COWELL, Journal StarTeacher Maileigh Camp holds Tailey Helmstadter, 7 months, at an Early Head Start classroom Tuesday at the Community Action Head Start K Street Center.
JUSTIN WAN, Journal StarLincoln Southwest's Brenly Noerrlinger (from left), Ja'Sara Wilson and Hadley Madson sing a chant during a game against Fremont on Tuesday at Doris Bair Complex.
KENNETH FERRIERA, Journal StarUSC's Ally Batenhorst (left) reacts as Nebraska fans cheer for her before Sunday's match at the Devaney Sports Center.
KATY COWELL, Journal StarAmy Bolton arranges several skeletons in tutus as she decorates her front yard for Halloween on Monday, Sept. 23, 2024, at her Lincoln home near 48th and High Street. Bolton has been decorating her yard with skeletons since she bought her home in 2020.
KATY COWELL Journal StarWhy Are COVID-19 Vaccination Rates So Low Right Now? It's Complicated.
Remember getting that first COVID-19 vaccine, back in the thick of the pandemic? After so much suffering, there was finally a sense of relief.
That mostly happened, but, of course, COVID-19 is still very much with us. The virus has evolved, and so has our behavior. As we enter what has now become the flu and COVID-19 season, people aren't lining up to get their shots anymore. One in five Massachusetts residents has gotten a COVID-19 vaccine this season, according to state data, while two in five have gotten their flu shot.
At the beginning of the pandemic, Dr. Nahid Bhadelia, founding director of the Boston University Center on Emerging Infectious Diseases, shed light and provided guidance on how to navigate the early stages on GBH's In It Together. She returned to GBH's All Things Considered to discuss with host Arun Rath about how we should be facing COVID-19 today. What follows is a lightly edited transcript of their conversation.
Arun Rath: I've got to say, to start off, that I didn't give your full introduction there. In the years since we last had you on the show — in 2022 and 2023, you were the senior policy advisor for the White House COVID-19 response team. Do you have any big takeaways from having worked at the White House? You know, lessons about how we dealt with the pandemic [that we can] maybe bring going forward?
Dr. Nahid Bhadelia: Yeah. I mean, I'm sure there are books that have been written already, and many won't be ready for probably decades because we did just live through a very exceptional time that was both devastating and, in some ways, brought us together. And then, in other ways, sort of created divisions, as crises often do.
I think some of the bigger lessons for emerging infectious diseases were really the importance of the connectivity of the infrastructure that we used during COVID — and how important that will remain moving forward.
We increased our capacity to detect new variants. It's going to be important to keep that kind of laboratory capacity for future threats. We strengthened our international partnerships so that, if there is a new crisis, we can more equitably share new medical countermeasures. I think that's going to be important. And how we do it more equitably moving forward is going to be important.
You and I spoke when I was in West Africa responding to the Ebola virus disease epidemic. We talked about trust, and so much of those principles were sort of carried out and made obvious during COVID-19 about, you know, building trust with our communities, and that remained kind of consistent, in my experience, through COVID-19.
It was very interesting — during COVID-19, I played multiple roles, right? I was a frontline clinician. I was part of our hospitals' and our state's preparedness. But then, you know, I also played a role in being a communicator.
I mean, it's been equally educational, as for everybody else, in terms of looking at the same problem from different perspectives — and, from those perspectives, realizing how complex it is to respond to these threats beyond just coming up with vaccines, diagnostics and treatments. You need so much more connective tissue.
I think one of the reasons I continue to work in my center, which focuses on exactly this kind of stuff, is that silver bullets are one thing, but, you know, connecting everything and ensuring that implementation happens and equity is something that we start with at the very beginning.
Rath: Looking at where we are now, in the fall of 2024, we're hearing that with the new COVID shots, vaccination rates are not great. I'm curious: since you've worked at all levels, what's your sense of what's going on right now?
Bhadelia: Yeah, I think there are a few elements. The good news part of this is that we are seeing, more than any other year before, the hospitalizations and deaths are lower around this time of year compared to prior years. The bad part of this is that COVID-19 has now become a continuous burden. It will continue to be a burden in the foreseeable future because we can't eradicate it.
Really, the best thing we can do is ensure that we decrease its impact on our society and on our health, and vaccines are a really critical part of that. They continue to provide sort of almost a level-up with the changing variants that are out there. [It's] very similar to what we do as a strategy for influenza, although COVID is a very different disease — it's, you know, more severe in some ways and has a lot of more obvious long-term impacts with long COVID, for some folks.
"It's not just COVID. I fear that some of it is all this politicization that we saw during COVID-19 around vaccinations and misinformation around vaccinations in general."
Dr. Nahid Bhadelia, founding director of the Boston University Center on Emerging Infectious Diseases
To your point about what's happening, what we saw coming out of this pandemic is that we're not even just seeing a decrease in people's interest in taking the COVID vaccines, but unfortunately, with dis- and misinformation, you're kind of seeing a drop in other vaccinations.
You're seeing childhood measles vaccination rates go down. Particularly among pregnant women, the influenza vaccination rates have gone down, which is really worrisome. A little less of a drop in terms of the general population, but also in kids, the influenza vaccination rates have gone down. So it's not just COVID. I fear that some of it is all this politicization that we saw during COVID-19 around vaccinations and misinformation around vaccinations in general.
One of the things that we did when I was at the White House was we spoke to a bunch of historians about prior plagues and what happens at the end of plagues. Without fail, one of the things that they said was coming out of large plagues, people almost go through an amnesia, right? They don't want to deal with the trauma of the last few years. I wonder if we're going through that period where people want to shut out the risk that the continued presence of COVID faces.
And then, the last thing, of course, is that the process through which you access vaccines has changed. It used to be, you know, all these different centers you could go get vaccinations with, and now you have to kind of navigate where to get vaccinations, which — by the way, if you're looking to get vaccines: vaccines.Gov. Find a close vaccination center near you.
For those who are underinsured or uninsured, there are multiple programs in the government, and then your insurance should coverage those shots as well. Here in Massachusetts, of course, everybody's covered with health insurance.
Rath: I'll give you a moment to underscore to people or explain why it's still important to get the COVID shots, even though it may not seem as deadly or as threatening at the moment.
Bhadelia: Arun, I think what's important to underscore is that vaccinations are an integral part of how we continue to keep COVID from becoming a severe disease that could overwhelm our health systems. Taking vaccinations helps reduce the severity of disease, which means the chances of you ending up in the hospital — particularly if you're someone who's high-risk — decreases when you take vaccinations.
And then because, over time — even if you got a shot last year — over time, because the virus is evolving and because your own immune system's memory might fade, you do need that repeated shot to help you get ready, particularly now as we're looking at the winter months, the holidays, people gathering, people traveling — it is so, so critical that we shore up our immunity with a shot.
Rath: I think one of the best arguments, for me at least, for getting this shot is that really awful fear of long COVID. Do we have a better sense of long COVID now, at this point, and where things might go with that?
Bhadelia: Yeah, we have a lot more understanding of the range of symptoms that people are presenting with. Unfortunately, I don't know that we have a rock-solid reason for why long COVID happens in some folks versus not. I mean, there's a lot of hints. There are multiple studies that have shown — in fact, as you just hinted to — that being vaccinated may reduce your chance of long COVID.
But what hasn't happened is a hands-on treatment. We have a better understanding of how long — and, in most cases, actually, people feel better after six months. But there's a whole range, so we don't yet have one treatment that could cure everybody.
We have supportive care, which is what we're still doing, but there are ongoing studies right now looking at the use of antivirals. We don't know yet if any of these things work, but I would definitely say that I would recommend to my patients to take the vaccine because it reduces the severity of disease. And what I've seen for most emerging infectious diseases is that if you reduce the severity early on, there's less damage to your body and, hopefully, less chances of long COVID.
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