The American Academy of Pediatrics released new COVID-19 vaccination guidelines, and for the first time, they diverged significantly from the recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

As Stephanie Syre reports, the changes leave parents with competing guidance as we head into the fall.

Omna, in May, Health Secretary Robert of Kennedy Jr. announced the CDC would no longer be

recommending the COVID shot for healthy children. But yesterday, the AAP issued contrary guidance,

saying all children under the age of two should receive a COVID shot to protect from severe illness. It also called on

insurers to continue covering the shots for that age group. For contacts, we're joined now by Dr. Paul

Offutt, pediatrician and director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.

Dr. Offutt, thank you for joining the program.

So this new AAP recommendation is based on the conclusion

that children under 23 months old

are at the highest risk of severe COVID.

But isn't it still relatively rare among children?

Do the numbers justify, you think, vaccinating all children under two?

So there was a presentation made by Fiona Havers of the CDC in April of this year looking at what has

been the impact of COVID on children in the previous year. And what she found was that

thousands of children

were hospitalized. Of those who were hospitalized, about one in five were admitted to the intensive

care unit, virtually all were unvaccinated, half were previously healthy, and 152 children died.

Most were less than four years of age. So I think the impact of this virus in that age group

still warrants getting a vaccine

if you've never had one. The CDC, as you know, under Secretary Kennedy, who is an overall

vaccine skeptic, has reached a totally different conclusion than the AAP.

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