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Influenza causes substantial illness among children. RCTs demonstrate that the influenza vaccine reduces active-surveillance-detected influenza but have insufficient samples to examine healthcare provider visits. This study documents that two-to-five-year-old children whose well-child visits occur when the seasonal-influenza vaccine is broadly available are 23.4 percentage points more likely to be vaccinated than those whose visits do not. Using large administrative healthcare datasets, we leverage this variation in vaccination rates to show that the vaccine reduces outpatient and ED visits significantly. The results imply that making pediatric influenza vaccinations more convenient could substantially increase vaccination rates and reduce healthcare expenditures.
