Vaccine tests starting to include younger kids
The 9-year-old twins didn’t flinch as each received test doses of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine – and then a sparkly bandage to cover the spot.
“Sparkles make everything better,” said Marisol Gerardo as she hopped off an exam table at Duke University to make way for her sister Alejandra.
Researchers in the U.S. and abroad are beginning to test younger children to make sure COVID-19 vaccines are safe and work for each age. The first shots are going to at-risk adults, but ending the pandemic will require vaccinating children, too.
“Kids should get the shot,” Marisol said after the sisters participated in Pfizer’s new study of children under age 12. She’s looking forward to when she can have sleepovers with friends.
So far in the U.S., teen testing is furthest along: Pfizer and Moderna expect to release results soon showing how two doses of their vaccines performed for those 12 and crowd. Pfizer is currently authorized for use starting at age 16;
Moderna is for 18 and older.
But younger children may need different doses than teens and adults. Moderna recently began a study similar to Pfizer’s new trial, as each hunts the right dosage for each age group as they work toward eventually vaccinating babies as young as 6 months.
Last month in Britain, Astrazeneca began a study of its vaccine among 6- to 17-year-olds. Johnson & Johnson is planning its own pediatric studies. In China, Sinovac recently announced it has submitted preliminary data to Chinese regulators showing its vaccine is safe in children as young as 3.
Getting this data is critical because countries must vaccinate children to achieve herd immunity, said Duke pediatric and vaccine specialist Dr. Emmanuel “Chip” Walter, who is helping to lead the Pfizer study.
Most COVID-19 vaccines being used around the world were first studied in tens of thousands of adults. Studies in children won’t need to be nearly as large: Researchers have safety information from those studies and vaccinations of millions of adults.
And because children’s infection rates are so low – they make up about 13% of COVID-19 cases documented in the U.S. – the focus of pediatric studies isn’t counting illnesses, but measuring whether the vaccines rev up youngsters’ immune systems much like they do those of adults.
Proving that is important because while children are less likely than adults to get seriously ill, at least 268 have died from COVID-19 in the U.S. and more than 13,500 have been hospitalized, according to a tally by the American Academy of Pediatrics. That’s more than die from the flu in an average year. A small number also have developed a serious inflammatory condition linked to the coronavirus.
Earlier this month, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the top U.S. infectious disease expert, told Congress he expected that high school students likely would begin getting vaccinated in the fall. Elementary students, he said, may not be eligible until early 2022.
For Marisol, the only part that was “a bit nerve-wracking and scary” was having to give a blood sample first.