Residents within the service area of the Sudbury health unit can expect to be hearing more about the importance of the COVID-19 vaccine for youngsters.
Public Health Sudbury and Districts (PHSD) is preparing communications for the expected approval of vaccines for children aged five to 11 years. The information was provided in the pre-agenda that was published for the upcoming Board of Health meeting that takes place this coming Thursday afternoon.
Health Canada has already said a decision on whether to authorize the vaccine for children could be coming by the end of November, which creates the possibility that vaccines will be delivered before the New Year.
Dr. Theresa Tam, Canada's chief medical officer, has said that the under-12 population — the only age group still ineligible for the vaccine — continues to have the highest incidence rates of COVID-19 across the country.
PHSD has a communications strategy and will encourage the public to regard the health unit website as a “credible source” of information.
"In the coming weeks, it is also anticipated that the COVID-19 vaccine will be approved for children aged 5 to 11. In preparation, a letter was recently sent to parents and guardians of children within this age group via school boards, alerting them to the anticipated rollout and directing them to our website as a credible source of information. A post to social media channels (Facebook and Twitter) was also developed," said the PHSD agenda.
The communications team has also launched an initiative called Great Questions, directed at young people. PHSD said youth are being encouraged to submit questions to public health about COVID-19 vaccines.
The idea is to engage young people by getting them to submit a video question, which is then answered by a health unit professional. One example has already been included on YouTube.
Younger area residents are invited to email their questions to [email protected] a video or written question where PHSD professionals will provide answers via social media channels.
"The goal is to answer as many of youth’s questions about COVID-19, reduce vaccine hesitancy, and help our community stay COVID-safe," said PHSD.
The communications team has also worked in partnership with the Family Health team to create a fact sheet regarding the importance of receiving a COVID-19 vaccine geared toward those who are pregnant, thinking of becoming pregnant, or breastfeeding.
