A New York woman with no medical qualifications was arrested after she allegedly administered the COVID-19 vaccine to a 17-year-old boy without his family's permission.
Laura Parker Russo, 54, was arrested by Nassau County Police after the incident happened on New Year's eve at her home in Sea Cliff, Long Island.
The boy reportedly received the vaccine and went home to tell his mother, who alerted police, Abc 7 reported. It is unclear how Russo knew the boy.
After an investigation, officials discovered that Russo is not a medical professional or authorized to administer vaccines. It is unclear how she had obtained the vaccine, and which brand it was.
Russo was then charged with unauthorized practice of a profession.
Her next court appearance is scheduled for January 21.
A New York woman with no medical qualifications was arrested after she allegedly administered the COVID-19 vaccine to a 17-year-old boy without his parent's permission (File photo)
The boy reportedly received the vaccine and went home to tell his mother, who alerted police. It is unclear how Russo knew the boy (File photo)
There have been several reported incidents across the country in which minors have been vaccinated without their parents' consent.
In early December, a Los Angeles mother claimed that her 13-year-old son, who has asthma, received the vaccine shot without her knowledge, NBC reported.
Maribel Duarte said that her son returned home from the Barack Obama Global Prep Academy in South Los Angeles with a vaccination card after he accepted the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine in exchange for pizza.
'I should have been involved,' Duarte told NBC Los Angeles.' The lady that gave him the shot and signed the paper told my son, 'Please don't say anything. I don't want to get in trouble.''
The card showed that the unidentified boy had two doses of his Pfizer vaccine, on October 28 and November 18. It is unclear when he told his mother about what had happened after the first or second shot.
'It hurt to know he got a shot without my permission, without knowing and without signing any papers for him to get the shot,' Duarte added.
Duarte is herself vaccinated against COVID, but said she did not want her son to receive the shot because he is asthmatic and suffers from allergies, which she fears puts him at greater risk of rare but potentially-serious side effects.
Maribel Duarte (pictured) claimed last month that her son returned home from the Barack Obama Global Prep Academy with a vaccination card without her consent
Duarte claims her son got two shots of the Pfizer vaccine without her consent (vaccination card pictured)
Ariana Fraser, a Florida mother, also said in December that her 5-year-old daughter was given a flu vaccination at her Lake Worth Beach school without her permission.
'We took the band-aid off and she had an injection mark, and on the paper it says she received a vaccination for a flu shot that we didn't approve of and the paper is not her name,' Fraser told CBS news.
'I was really upset and frustrated because if something bad would have happened to her, if she would have got sick,' Fraser added.
Fraser's daughter, a kindergartner at North Grade Elementary, had reacted badly to inoculations before, despite having all of her required vaccinations.
Health Hero, the private company that administered the vaccine at North Grade, had been accused before of giving the shot to a wrong kindergartner in Jacksonville, because his name was similar to another boy whose parents consented to the vaccine.
Ariana Fraser, a Florida mother, also said in December that her 5-year-old daughter was given a flu vaccination at her Lake Worth Beach school without her permission
Fraser's daughter, a kindergartner at North Grade Elementary, had reacted badly to inoculations before, despite having all of her required vaccinations
California became the first state in the country to announce plans to mandate the COVID-19 vaccine for children in schools.
In the United states, more than 14.7percent of children 5-11 have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19, while 53.4 of minors 12-17 people have been fully vaccinated.
Pfizer said last month it would test three doses of its COVID vaccine in young children under five years old, after two jabs failed to produce the expected immunity in babies and preschoolers.
Two doses didn't appear strong enough in some of the kids, the company said, saying that a preliminary analysis found 2- to 4-year-olds' immune response wasn't as strong as expected to the lose-dose jabs for younger children.
If three doses proves successful, Pfizer and its partner BioNTech said they would apply for emergency authorization sometime in the first half of 2022.
The company already has a 'kid-sized' vaccine for 5- to 11-year-olds, which is one-third the dosage given to adults and children 12 and older.
The United States has reported more than 825,000 deaths since the beginning of the pandemic.
Just 790 children aged 0-18 have lost their lives to COVID since the beginning of the pandemic and December 22, according to the most recent figures supplied by the CDC.
There are more than 54 million active COVID-19 infections in the country.
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