Nearly all teens needing intensive care for covid-19 were unvaccinated, study shows

“Nearly all hospitalizations and deaths in this population could have been prevented by vaccination,” writes Kathryn M. Edwards, scientific director of the Vanderbilt Vaccine Research Program

January 14, 2022

Nearly all teenagers needing intensive care for covid-19 were unvaccinated in a study of more than 1,000 hospital patients in the United States, the Washington Post reports.

The Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine prevented 94 percent of hospitalizations and was 98 percent effective at keeping patients out of intensive care (ICU) or from requiring life support, per the peer-reviewed analysis published Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine.

As pediatric hospitalizations surge in many parts of the United States, fueled by the more transmissible omicron variant, the study’s findings help illustrate how vaccination can protect young people from severe complications and death.

“Nearly all hospitalizations and deaths in this population could have been prevented by vaccination,” writes Kathryn M. Edwards, scientific director of the Vanderbilt Vaccine Research Program, in an editorial to the journal about the study, which was conducted by experts from pediatric hospitals in collaboration with researchers from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

About 36 percent of children between 12 and 17 have not received any dose of a vaccine, according to the CDC. That’s months after the Food and Drug Administration authorized the Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine in May for those between 12 and 15. The CDC has since also recommended that children between 12 and 17 get a booster dose.