The number of children sick with Covid-19 being hospitalized is also increasing.
Washington:
U.S. health authorities on Monday approved the Pfizer Covid-19 booster shot for children under 12 years of age and reduced the wait time between the initial vaccination and an additional dose from six months to five months. , for all ages.
The Food and Drug Administration’s decision comes amid a pandemic, as the highly transmissible variant of Omicron flares up, outbreaks and as millions of students return to classrooms after the holidays. .
The FDA has also approved a booster dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine for immunocompromised children between the ages of 5 and 11, including those who have received an organ transplant, for example.
The agency said it relied specifically on data from Israel, where thousands of children aged 12 to 15 have received booster doses.
In addition, with more than 4.1 million people 16 years of age and older in Israel receiving booster shots starting five months after the initial two doses, “no new safety concerns have emerged.” , the FDA said in a statement.
“Authorization of booster vaccinations takes place after five months instead of six months, so there may soon be better protection for individuals against the highly transmissible variant of Omicron.”
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention still needs to give final approval to the decisions, which are expected in the coming days.
The United States is currently recording an average of about 400,000 new Covid cases per day, a record high since the pandemic began two years ago, according to data collected by Johns Hopkins University.
Hospitalizations have also increased, but not to the same extent and are still below the peak recorded a year ago.
Hospitalization rates of children sick with Covid-19 are also on the rise, with vaccination rates significantly lower among young children.
However, officials are eager to keep schools open as much as possible.
US Education Secretary Miguel Cardona said Sunday on Fox News that “We’re aware there could be some bumps in the road, especially in the coming week” with teachers caught up in the wave. increase in Covid across the country, said US Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona.
“But the goal is full-time face-to-face learning for our students,” he added. “They’ve suffered enough.”
(Except for the title, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from an aggregated feed.)
