Published 2 days ago,
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in collaboration with
Dr Gérald Kierzek (Medical Director of Doctissimo)
Medical validation:
May 23, 2022
On Thursday, May 19, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommended a new Pfizer vaccine booster for children ages 5-11. The goal? “Provide continuous protection against Covid-19”.
The Centers for Disease Prevention and Control (CDC) expert committee has decided. On Thursday, he approved the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine booster for children ages 5 to 11. This would be a third dose for healthy children and a fourth dose for immunocompromised children. This must be injected 5 months after the first two injections.
Booster dose boosts antibodies 36 times
11 experts voted in favor of the booster dose recommendation issued earlier this week by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
The reason ? Low antibody levels had been observed in children who had received a series of primary vaccinations. The booster doses had for their part reached higher levels of antibodies than those observed after the first series.
Data from a clinical trial of 4,500 children aged 5 to 11 also support this: the booster dose increases anti-Omicron antibodies in children by 36 times and it does not seem to cause “no new security issues“.
According to CDC recommendations, this dose should be injected at least 5 months after the first series of two injections. The dosage used is 10 µg, compared to 30 µg for ages 12 and older.
“Initial vaccination with two doses in this age group has lagged behind other age groups, making them vulnerable to severe disease“said Rochelle Walensky, director of the CDC, in a press release.
This authorization comes at a time when the number of Covid-19 cases is exploding in the United States, with around 90,000 new cases declared per day. American children seem particularly affected: theAmerican Academy of Pediatrics found an increase in Covid-19 cases of 76%, compared to the last fortnight.
Furthermore, even though Covid-19 tends to be less severe in children than adults, “the wave linked to the Omicron variant has made more children sick and led to more hospitalizations and children suffering long-term effects”underlined Robert Califf, head of the FDA.
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Towards a 3rd booster dose for children in France?
In France, since the end of December, vaccination is open to all children aged 5 to 11 years. The vaccine available is three times less dosed than that for adults. The two doses of vaccines are administered 3 weeks apart. However, no third dose is currently being considered by the authorities. A good thing according to Dr. Kierzek:
“American children are not comparable with French children because the proportion of obesity is higher there. In France, the risk-benefit balance is not favourable. Only the most fragile children should be vaccinated. We need to move from a generalized vaccination strategy to a personalized strategy“.
In addition, some children are exceptions in the context of vaccination.
These are children who have already contracted Covid-19 (who should only receive a single dose), children who contracted the virus more than 15 days after the first dose of vaccine (a single dose for them too) and children infected with coronavirus less than 15 days after the first dose of vaccine. The latter must receive a second dose two months after infection.
These recommendations do not apply to children with contraindications (especially those severely immunocompromised), recalls the ARS.