PORTLAND, Maine (AP) Maine has started its rollout of COVID-19 vaccines to middle schoolers and early high schoolers.

U.S. regulators this week expanded the use of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine to children as young as 12. Health care providers in Maine said they began giving the shots to children age 12 to 15 in the state on Wednesday.

Northern Light Health said it would offer the vaccine to everyone eligible at its clinic at Portland Expo starting on Wednesday. Central Maine Healthcare said it started providing the vaccine to newly eligible children at its high-volume vaccination site at the Auburn Mall on Wednesday as well.

“This is an important step forward in our work against COVID,” said Dr. Nirav Shah, director of the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention. “Kids can transmit COVID, for example, to older people who live in their household.”

The expansion of eligibility for a vaccine came as Maine continued to outpace most of the nation in vaccine progress. About 59% of the eligible population in Maine has received at least a first dose of the coronavirus vaccine.

About 40% of the state is fully vaccinated. That number is about 32% for the country as a whole.

Providers who are offering the vaccine in Maine said children need parental consent to receive one.

Shah also said the state’s mobile vaccination unit will be extended until July 2. The clinic provides vaccines to adults only at this time.