Here's When Dr. Fauci Says Children Can Get The COVID Vaccine

Now that Johnson & Johnson has begun distributing its COVID-19 vaccine, joining the two other COVID vaccines on the market (via NPR), many are wondering if this will speed up the process of everyone getting vaccinated.

We may have to wait several more months for that to happen, though, according to infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci. While it's looking like many in the U.S. will be able to get vaccinated this year, Fauci recently told Meet the Press that young children may have to wait until next year. "If you project realistically when we'll be able to get enough data to be able to say that elementary school children will be able to be vaccinated, I would think that would be, at the earliest, the end of the year, and very likely the first quarter of 2022," he said. 

Fauci continued, "But for the high school kids, it looks like some time this fall. I'm not sure it's exactly on the first day that school opens, but pretty close to that."

Fauci is also urging people to get vaccinated as soon as they can. While some are concerned that the Johnson & Johnson vaccine is less effective based on trial data, Fauci insists that people should not hesitate to receive the vaccine. "All three of them are really quite good, and people should take the one that's most available to them," he said on Meet the Press. "If you go to a place and you have J&J, and that's the one that's available now, I would take it. I personally would do the same thing. I think people need to get vaccinated as quickly and as expeditiously as possible."

While Fauci has already been vaccinated, he said, "If I would go to a place where they had J&J, I would have no hesitancy whatsoever to take it."