I have two teenagers - one is fully vaccinated against Covid and the other is too young to have it.
My eldest daughter Gracie is just 16 but as an asthmatic she is classed as clinically vulnerable and got called for the vaccine months ago.
She jumped at the chance and almost saw it as a badge of honour to be the first among her friends to get the jab.
Lola is just 14 so isn’t eligible - but both she and I are desperate for her to have it.
Last term Covid ripped through her school in Bolton - at the time the town with the highest rates of the virus in the country - and kids and teachers were dropping like flies.
People who think teens only suffer mild symptoms of the virus are wrong. Some of her friends were seriously ill - one was even hospitalised.
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Another girl’s mum told me her daughter had been the sickest she had ever been in her life - a combination of flu and a sickness bug which floored her for weeks.
And that’s before you even consider the possibility of long Covid; none of us can predict what impact the virus can have on the long-term health of our kids.
If the vaccination is safe for over-16s surely it must be safe for those aged 12 and over like most other medications?
Schools have already become proven breeding grounds for the disease - the perfect environment of thousands of kids mixing closely for seven hours a day.
It makes perfect sense to me to use the summer holidays as a chance to get these teenage super-spreaders vaccinated before they return to class in September.
Our teens have missed out on so much during the pandemic - Gracie saw her GCSEs cancelled, prom cancelled, festivals cancelled. That whole 16-year-old coming of age summer of fun never happened and they can’t get that first summer of freedom back.
It is no surprise to me that not a single one of my girls’ friends say they will refuse the vaccine.
When clinics in Bolton started offering jabs to over-16s a couple of months ago when case rates in the town had rocketed, Gracie’s friends happily queued for hours to get their vaccine.
For these kids who have had their lives put on hold they see it as a passport to freedom and making up for all those parties and nights out they missed.
And not to mention protecting their parents and grandparents. Teens get a bad rap but my girls and their friends are respectful enough to still wear masks in shops to make older people feel less vulnerable.
So while Gracie feels like her double-jabbed status is the first step back to a normal life, her sister and her friends are still in limbo - and at risk.
The sooner the government roles out the vaccine programme to younger teens the sooner more parents like me can breathe a sigh of relief.
