COVID-19 Vaccine Might Be Available for Adult but Not for Children Before Fall 2021

COVID-19 vaccine has been in a rush to make it for adults. But the pandemic made many parents ask if they can get a vaccine for their children. 

Adults may be able to have a vaccine by next summer, according to The New York Times. However, kids will have to wait a lot longer before they can have one. The U.S. government's Operation Warp Speed and several programs made it to provide several COVID-19 vaccines for adults in advanced clinical trials. Yet, there are no trials begun in the United States to determine if these vaccines are safe and effective for children. 

Dr. Evan Anderson, a pediatrician at Children's Healthcare of Atlanta and a professor at the Emory University School of Medicine, said, "Right now I'm pretty worried that we won't have a vaccine available for kids by the start of next school year. Dr. Anderson and his colleagues published a commentary on Friday in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases calling for vaccine makers to act together. They called it, "Warp Speed for Covid-19 Vaccines: Why are Children Stuck in Neutral?"

As soon as researchers isolated the virus in January, the search for a COVID-19 vaccine started. Across the world, teams of developers began creating coronavirus vaccines based on several techniques. Some delivered viral genes into the body, triggering immune cells into action; others used inactivated coronaviruses that stimulated the immune system to make its own antibodies.

(Photo : Charlein Gracia)
COVID-19 Vaccine Might Be Available for Adult but Not for Children Before Fall 2021

Developers started down a well-worn path of rigorous protocols once they were ready to test those vaccines. These protocols were developed over decades to check if a vaccine is safe and effective. Vaccines need incredibly strict tests as they are fundamentally different from drugs intended for a limited number of ill people with a particular disease. Meanwhile, vaccines are given to millions of healthy people to prevent them from getting sick.

Developers start clinical trials on people after testing a vaccine on animals. These trials went on three phases, from small to large. Phase 1 and 2 trials enable vaccine developers to determine which dose will be the safest while delivering the best immune protection. Phase 3 trials, the last stage of vaccine testing, are made by carrying out on thousands or even tens of thousands of volunteers. During these studies, scientists can get clear evidence that a COVID-19 vaccine protects people from the disease. Trials can also reveal the side effects missed by smaller studies. 

If researchers discovered no severe side effects, they would start testing the vaccines in children, starting with teenagers, then working down to younger ages. Vaccine developers know that children are not miniature adults. Children's biology is different in that it may affect vaccines. For example, children's airways are smaller; they can be vulnerable to low inflammation levels that could be harmless to an adult. 

Trials enable developers to adjust the vaccine's dosage to achieve the best immune protection with the lowest risk of having side effects from children. The doses that adults and children are sometimes different- children get smaller amounts. For example, children get bigger doses for pertussis but smaller doses of hepatitis B vaccines.

In recent decades, the process has proved safe and successful. Childhood vaccines saved millions of lives. Expanding access to the measles vaccine alone resulted in a 78% decrease in mortality between 2000 and 2008. Worldwide, the process prevented an estimated 12.7 million deaths.

The testing needed approval for the Food and Drug Administration on a vaccine might take a decade or more in the past. Researchers have pointed ways to elevate their development in recent years, while not sacrificing the study to demonstrate safety and effectiveness.

Some vaccine makers figured out how to combine phases when the pandemic hit, gathering more information in the same period. Governments and philanthropic organizations offered assistance for expensive clinical trials and for building factories to produce vaccines.

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