It was explained to me that RSV is a concern for adults more because they transmit it to young children who are at much greater risk from it. Most adults who get it don’t even know it from another routine illness (sounds like your parents were an exception). I’m not a doctor, this is just how it was explained to me.

This is completely wrong. The RSV vaccine was not approved until May of 2023. The push to release this vaccine, and for older adults to receive it is tangentially related to COVID in multiple ways.

First, the COVID lockdowns caused a massive resurgent wave of RSV infections in both young children and older adults due to the fact that it is a childhood illness with some degree of lifelong immunity that wanes as the virus mutates over time as well as from the degradation of your immune system as you age. When that infection chain in younger children was broken it had consequences on the intensity and mutation of the virus that were not necessarily unprecedented, but perhaps unexpected. This is what lead to a large number of very serious infections in younger children, and then older people in a very short amount of time. I’m not a scientist, but you can look up the statistics for yourself if you’re interested.

Secondarily, the research into COVID vaccines as well as this rise in rebound cases of RSV spurred on the push to study, test, and release these RSV vaccines for adults over the age of 60 who were most at risk. These vaccines have not been approved for children, or anyone under the age of 60 in any country in the world thus far. Again, I am not a scientist, and I do not understand the complexities that lead to so many failures in producing an effective vaccine for RSV when it has been attempted since at least the 1960’s. However, I do know that multiple RSV vaccines that went through human trials in children caused deaths from severe immune responses when patients experienced natural infection. So it is unlikely any vaccine will be created that is either capable or intended to provide prophylactic protection from native infection in children. The current vaccines are intended to strengthen the already existing immune response in adults only, and those are two somewhat different things.

Edit:

• Here is the citation from the Lancet regarding deaths from serious immune responses during human trials of a previous vaccine that was attempted during the 1960’s.

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanmic/article/PIIS2666-5247(23)00195-7/fulltext#:~:text=On May 3%2C 2023%2C the,Union on June 7%2C 2023

• Additional information from the New York Times regarding the Monoclonal Antibody drug that was released for use in infants as a form of passive immunity to fight pre-existing infections. This is fundamentally different from a vaccine, and has an entirely different action mechanism.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/17/health/rsv-infants-fda.html

• An in depth explanation of the difference between active immunity provided by vaccines, versus passive immunity to pre-existing infection provided my monoclonal antibodies.

https://www.astrazeneca.com/what-science-can-do/topics/covid-19/covid-19-difference-between-antibodies-and-vaccines.html#:~:text=Vaccines are a type of active immunity.&text=They require a healthy immune,to produce infection-fighting cells.&text=Monoclonal antibodies are a type of passive immunity.