Vaccination to Protect Children from Coronavirus

It’s important to understand that very young children can be infected with coronavirus and transmit to others unknowingly. The major contribution to reduce virus transmission in children is vaccinating them. "Together with our partner BioNTech, we have dosed the first healthy children in a global Phase study to further evaluate the safety, tolerability, and immunogenicity of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine (BNT162b2) in preventing COVID-19 in healthy children 6 months to 11 years old," a spokesperson for Pfizer tells PEOPLE in a statement.

To see whether vaccines are safe and effective in children, vaccine makers like Pfizer and Moderna have started first phase clinical trials in children as young as 6 months old with parents’ consent among 5000 children nationwide. In the first phase trial, the children will have second dose after 28 days for moderna and 21 days for Pfizer. The latest report on vaccination trial on children aged 12 to 15 by Pfizer proved to be effective has convinced them to begin trial among younger age group.

The significance of this first phase trial is to determine the amount of vaccine the children can tolerate and shield against the virus, which is referred by the researchers as dosing trial.

After the dosing trial, the second phase trial will be done by dividing children into placebo (control) and treatment groups. These studies have to be followed for a year and they expect a safety results in the second half of 2021.

“Our concern is that with increased or stable and ongoing transmission of these viruses, we will see more mutants develop, which can potentially escape from vaccine-induced immunity,” Dr. Yvonne Maldonado, professor of paediatrics, epidemiology and population health at Stanford University said.

These trials have provided some comfort among families that early protection given to young children from coronavirus.

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Source-Medindia