CDC study claims COVID vaccines protect kids amidst growing doubts and political pressure

A new study from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says COVID-19 vaccines continue to protect healthy children from serious illness, even as questions about the shots have grown in recent months.

The findings were published in the CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR), the agency’s main scientific journal.

According to the study, COVID vaccines lowered the risk of emergency room and urgent care visits caused by the virus by 76% in children aged 9 months to 4 years. For children between 5 and 17 years, the risk was reduced by 56%.

The data is based on nearly 98,000 emergency room and urgent care visits recorded between late August 2024 and early September 2025. Researchers said the analysis focused only on the added protection from the 2024-25 COVID vaccines, even though many children had prior infections or earlier vaccinations.

The report comes at a time when some senior federal health officials have publicly questioned whether COVID vaccines still benefit healthy children.

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has previously claimed there is no reliable clinical evidence showing that COVID shots protect healthy kids. Those statements have raised concern among public health experts. Dr. Debra Houry, the CDC’s former chief medical officer, said the new findings are reassuring. “It is good to see that data and science are still coming out of the MMWR,” Houry said after the study was released. She resigned from the CDC in August.

The CDC’s vaccine guidance has shifted in 2025 under new leadership. In May, the agency stopped universally recommending COVID vaccines for healthy children and pregnant women, moving instead toward a shared decision-making approach between families and doctors.

In September, a CDC advisory panel also voted against broad recommendations for COVID boosters, advising parents to consult pediatricians about whether vaccination makes sense for their child.

At the same time, former and current public health officials have warned that political pressure may be interfering with scientific research at federal agencies.

In a recent editorial published in The New England Journal of Medicine, 12 former FDA commissioners pushed back against claims that COVID vaccines are unsafe for children, writing that “substantial evidence shows vaccination reduces the risk of severe disease and hospitalization in many children and adolescents.”

Health experts say the new CDC data reinforces what earlier studies have shown that COVID vaccines remain effective at preventing severe outcomes in children, even if protection against infection itself may decline over time.

Doctors continue to advise parents to speak directly with pediatricians, especially for children with underlying health conditions or frequent exposure risks.