A group of more than 40 doctors, medics and scientists is calling the UK government’s plan to vaccinate children for COVID “irresponsible, unethical and unnecessary.”
In an open letter addressed to the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency, the group said no one under 18 should be vaccinated for COVID because evidence shows the virus poses almost no risk to healthy children.
The letter was written in response to leaked documents from the UK National Health service detailing how UK health authorities plan to give COVID vaccines to children over 12 years old.
According to the documents, children as young as 5 years old could be vaccinated as early as July — a move the government said may be necessary to keep COVID cases down as lockdowns lift across the country.
The authors of the letter said the risk of death from COVID in healthy children is 1 in 1.25 million. COVID vaccines, however, are linked to strokes due to cerebral venous thromboses in people under 40 — a finding that “led to the suspension of the Oxford-AstraZeneca children’s trial,” the authors said.
The letter states:
“Children have a lifetime ahead of them, and their immunological and neurological systems are still in development, making them potentially more vulnerable to adverse effects than adults.”
Read “COVID-19 Child Vaccination: Safety and Ethical Concerns — An Open Letter From UK Doctors to Dr. June Raine, Chief Executive, MHRA”:
We wish to notify you of our grave concerns regarding all proposals to administer COVID-19 vaccines to children. Recently leaked Government documents suggested that a COVID-19 vaccine rollout in children over 12 years old is already planned for September 2021, and the possibility of children as young as 5 years old being vaccinated in the summer in a worst-case scenario.
We have been deeply disturbed to hear several Government and SAGE representatives calling in the media for the COVID-19 vaccine rollout to be “turning to children as fast as we can”. Teaching materials circulated to London schools contain emotionally loaded questions and inaccuracies. In addition, there has been disturbing language used by teaching union leaders, implying that coercion of children to accept the COVID-19 vaccines through peer pressure in schools was to be encouraged, despite the fact that coercion to accept a medical treatment is against UK and International Laws and Declarations. Rhetoric such as this is irresponsible and unethical, and encourages the public to demand the vaccination of minors with a product still at the research stage and about which no medium- or long-term effects are known, against a disease which presents no material risk to them. A summary of our reasons is given below and a more detailed fully referenced explanation is available.
