Why to Get a COVID-19 Vaccine

What You Need to Know

There are many benefits of getting vaccinated against COVID-19.

• COVID-19 vaccines available in the United States are effective at protecting people from getting seriously ill, being hospitalized, and even dying—especially people who are boosted.
• As with vaccines for other diseases, you are protected best when you stay up to date with the recommended number of doses and boosters.
• COVID-19 vaccines even offer protection to people who had COVID-19, including protection against being hospitalized from a new infection.
• COVID-19 vaccines are safe—much safer than getting COVID-19.

COVID-19 Vaccination Is a Safer, More Reliable Way to Build Protection

Getting sick with COVID-19 can have serious consequences.

• Getting sick with COVID-19 can cause severe illness or death, even in children, and we can’t reliably predict who will have mild or severe illness.
• You may have long-term health issues after having COVID-19. Even people who do not have symptoms when they are first infected can have these ongoing health problems.

While people can get some protection from having COVID-19, the level and length of that protection varies.

• Immunity (protection) from infection can vary depending on how mild or severe someone’s illness was and their age.
• Immunity from infection decreases over time.
• Importantly, there is still not an antibody test available that can reliably determine if a person is protected from further infection.

COVID-19 Vaccines Are Effective

As with vaccines for other diseases, people are protected best when they stay up to date with their COVID-19 vaccinations. However, the protection the vaccines provide decreases over time, especially for certain groups of people. For this reason, CDC recommends everyone ages 12 and older get a booster for the best protection against COVID-19.

People who have certain medical conditions or who are taking medications that weaken their immune system are at increased risk of severe COVID-19 illness and death. Additionally, their immune response to COVID-19 vaccination may not be as strong as in people who are not immunocompromised. People who are moderately or severely immunocompromised have specific COVID-19 vaccine recommendations, including recommendations for boosters.

Vaccines Help Protect Children from Serious Complications

Children and teens who get COVID-19 can develop serious complications like MIS-C, a condition where different body parts become inflamed, including the heart, lungs, kidneys, brain, skin, eyes, or gastrointestinal organs.

Getting eligible children and teens vaccinated against COVID-19 can help keep them:

• From getting really sick if they do get COVID-19

• In school or daycare
• Safely participating in sports, playdates, and other group activities.

COVID-19 Vaccines Are Safe for Children and Adults

While COVID-19 vaccines were developed quickly, all steps have been taken to ensure their safety and effectiveness.

• COVID-19 vaccines were developed using science that has been around for decades.
• Before COVID-19 vaccines were recommended, including for children ages 5 through 18 years, scientists conducted clinical trials with thousands of adults and children and found no serious safety concerns.
• Hundreds of millions of people in the United States have received COVID-19 vaccines under the most intensive safety monitoring program in U.S. history.
• Serious side effects that could cause a long-term health problem are extremely unusual following any vaccination, including COVID-19 vaccination. The benefits of COVID-19 vaccination outweigh the known and potential risks.

In most situations, mRNA COVID-19 vaccines (Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna) are preferred over the J&J/Janssen COVID-19 vaccine for primary and booster vaccination due to the risk of serious adverse events.