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An order the Virginia Department of Health issued Wednesday now makes it easier for eligible Virginians to get vaccines in the weeks ahead. (Woods, 9/10)

An executive directive issued this week by the New Jersey Department of Health allows anyone six months or older to receive the COVID-19 vaccine. A standing order also authorizes pharmacists to administer the shot without a prescription to individuals ages three and older. ... And in Pennsylvania, pharmacists are now allowed to follow vaccine recommendations from trusted authorities, such as the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Academy of Family Physicians, instead of waiting for guidance from the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), which was not scheduled to meet until October. (Staff and Pinder, 9/11)

Gov. Ned Lamont on Wednesday issued a slew of executive actions seeking to protect COVID-19 vaccine access in Connecticut amid recent federal changes that are causing confusion over who’s eligible for shots, where people can get them and how much they’re going to cost. (Golvala, 9/10)

One of the nation’s largest pharmaceutical chains has walked back its offering of the COVID-19 vaccine to Oregonians without a prescription as pharmacies and the state government await clarity from a federal public health agency in the midst of political upheaval. Patients in Oregon and nationwide have struggled to make appointments for COVID boosters, which in recent years have been a routine fall offering alongside flu shots, after the federal Food and Drug Administration tried to limit who can get the shots. (Nanguneri, 9/9)

Emergent BioSolutions announced yesterday that it has received a $56 million contract extension to supply the US government with doses of a combined smallpox/mpox vaccine. The single-dose vaccine, ACAM2000, was first approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in 2007 for active immunization against smallpox in people considered to be at high risk of infection, then for active immunization against mpox in high-risk individuals in 2024. It's one of two FDA-approved smallpox and mpox vaccines, along with Bavarian Nordic's Jynneos vaccine. (Dall, 9/10)

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said at a Senate hearing on Thursday that children receive up to 92 vaccine doses in early childhood "in order to be fully compliant between maternity and 18 years." But doctors tell ABC News that that number isn't accurate. Excluding annual flu and COVID-19 shots, children generally receive roughly 30 vaccine doses – many in combined injections – before the age of 18. (Cobern, 9/10)

Relative to uninfected children, COVID-19 patients aged 8 to 17 years were at a 49% higher risk for new-onset depression or anxiety in 2021, rising to 59% in those with severe illness, according to a University of Utah study published this week in PLOS One. (Van Beusekom, 9/10)