AP Medical Writer

Hugs with friends. Birthday parties indoors. Pillow fights. School children who got their first COVID-19 shots Wednesday said these are the pleasures they look forward to as the U.S. enters a major new phase in fighting the pandemic.

Health officials hailed shots for kids aged 5 to 11 as a major breakthrough after more than 18 months of illness, hospitalizations, deaths and disrupted education.

Kid-sized doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine cleared two final hurdles Tuesday — a recommendation from CDC advisers, followed by a green light from Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

At a Decatur, Georgia, pediatrician’s office Wednesday, 10-year-old Mackenzie Olson took off her black leather jacket and rolled up her sleeve as her mother looked on.

“I see my friends but not the way I want to. I want to hug them, play games with them that we don’t normally get to,” and have a pillow fight with her best friend, Mackenzie said after getting her shot at the Children’s Medical Group site.

With the federal government promising enough vaccine to protect the nation’s 28 million kids in this age group, pediatricians’ offices and hospitals began inoculating children, with schools, pharmacies and other locations planning to follow suit in the days ahead.

Brian Giglio, 40, of Alexandria, Virginia, brought his 8-year-old son, Carter, in for vaccination at Children’s National Hospital in Washington, D.C., where kids with underlying conditions got first dibs. Carter has Type 1 diabetes that puts him at risk for complications if he were to become infected.

“Carter is the last in our house to get vaccinated and he was always the one that we had the most concern about,” Giglio said. “And so today is like a hallway pass for us to begin living life again and we couldn’t be more thankful to everybody that’s been involved in this process to helping us feel that freedom that we feel today.”

Carter said he can’t wait to leave masks behind once he’s fully vaccinated, so he can smell the things he used to be able to smell without it.

“I’m ready to trash it,” he said, though the CDC still recommends masks in schools and indoor public spaces where virus activity is high, even for the fully vaccinated.

Cate Zeigler-Amon, 10, was first in line Wednesday for a drive-through vaccination at Viral Solutions in Atlanta. The girl bounced around the car in excitement before the shot, which she broadcast live on her computer during morning announcements at her elementary school.

Afterward, Cate said she was “very, very, very excited and very happy,” looking forward to hugging her friends and celebrating her birthday indoors next month “instead of having a freezing cold outside birthday party.”

Hartford Hospital in Connecticut vaccinated seven youngsters Tuesday night, minutes after CDC’s director gave the OK, and three more early Wednesday. Mostly staffers’ children, the kids were waiting for the CDC announcement, said Eric Arlia, senior pharmacy director for Hartford HealthCare in Connecticut.

One girl squeezed her eyes shut and a boy barely flinched as they got their shots and other waiting kids applauded, local media video showed.

“It feels like another important step on the journey to being able to vaccinate as many people as we can and put the pandemic to an end,” Arlia said.

The vaccine — one-third the dose given to older children and adults and administered with kid-sized needles — requires two doses three weeks apart, plus two more weeks for full protection. That means children who get vaccinated before Thanksgiving will be covered by Christmas.

“The timing before winter holidays is very fortunate,” said Dr. Jennifer Shu, whose Children’s Medical Group office in Decatur, Georgia, began vaccinating first thing Wednesday. “This age group will be able to spend holidays with friends and family more safely than they have been able to since the start of the pandemic.”

Sarah Kerr’s children, ages 6 and 7, are Shu’s patients and she hopes to get them vaccinated by week’s end. Her kindergartner son has a chromosome disorder, receives special education and is at risk for severe illness if he got infected, Kerr said.

“My son, who can’t wear a mask and has been fully dependent on those around him to protect him, it will give him a line of defense,” Kerr said.