By Camille Andersen

The city of Somerville held a virtual panel on June 29 about keeping our kids safe and the COVID vaccine. The panel was moderated by Felice Freyer, a health policy and public health reporter at the Boston Globe, and featured three doctors, Dr. Ashish K. Jha, Dr. Julia Koehler, Dr. Treniece Lewis Harris, and one parent, Vanessa Meneses.

The event began by allowing each panelist time to give opening remarks about the COVID vaccine. Dr. Jha provided an overview of where the county stands with COVID. He expects the vaccine to be approved for children aged 5-11 in the fall. He assured listeners that the current data suggests the vaccines are safe and incredibly effective.

Dr. Koehler spoke about her experience working at Boston Children’s Hospital throughout the pandemic and emphasized that children are affected by COVID.

Dr. Harris spoke about the mental health effects of the pandemic on children and the anxiety many children have surrounding vaccines.

Vanessa Meneses is a mom of two and a member of La Colaborativa, a Chelsea based organization empowering Latinx immigrants to enhance the health of the community. She recounted her experience talking with Dr. Koehler and others at the organization about her fears surrounding vaccinating her son. After talking with doctors at La Colaborativa, Meneses decided to vaccinate her son and encourages other parents to do the same once their children are eligible.

All four panelists encouraged parents to vaccinate their children once they are eligible. After their opening thoughts, they began answering questions submitted by listeners. Many questions expressed concern about efficacy and potential side effects of the vaccine.

The doctors responded that the current vaccines, especially Moderna and Pfizer, are incredibly effective against all current variants of the virus. They also emphasized the safety of the vaccine and that clinical trials currently show no long-term side effects of vaccination. “You can either get immunity from the vaccine or from an infection, and it’s very clear to me which is safer,” said Dr. Jha.

The doctors also addressed concerns about children returning to in-person school. With the proper precautions, such as mask wearing and ventilation, it is very possible to get kids back in school safely. Ventilation does not need to be an investment, even opening the doors and windows makes a difference.

The pandemic has also had mental health effects on children causing many to feel increased anxiety surrounding returning to in-person learning or getting vaccinated. Dr. Harris spoke about the need to provide age-appropriate information to children and explore the nature of their fears. Primary care doctors and mental health professionals can help provide information or behavioral techniques to help children feel more comfortable with the transition.

Dr. Koehler and Dr. Harris both addressed the disparities that occurred in the pandemic response between Massachusetts communities. Communities with less resources often had jobs that required them to leave their homes, putting them at higher risk for COVID infection.

The current trends show that wealthy communities who had low rates of infection in Massachusetts have the highest rates of COVID vaccination, and communities with fewer resources had higher rates of infection and have the lowest rates of vaccination. Dr. Harris spoke about the importance of door-to-door community outreach to provide information about vaccines and to address the differences in privilege we had throughout this pandemic, such as ability to work from home, access to medical care, and accurate vaccine information in our native languages. She spoke about the history of misuse in communities for medicine, particularly African American communities, and the importance of community events like this one to address these questions and provide information.

During their final thoughts, each doctor stressed the importance of protecting our children and restated their trust in the safety and effectiveness of the vaccines. In regard to vaccinating children, Dr. Harris said, “When the CDC says now we think it is okay to do this, there is a lot of thought and care that has gone behind that.”