BUFFALO, N.Y. — While New Yorkers wait to see when a COVID-19 vaccine will be distributed, their children might have to wait a bit longer to receive one.
"Children need to be studied," said American Academy of Pediatrics President Dr. Sally Goza.
"We have to have clinical trials for children to be included in the vaccine distribution and that hasn't happened yet."
The AAP has persistently called on manufacturers to include children in their vaccine trials, and now some of the largest groups are:
Pfizer
In September, Pfizer began including teenagers as young as 16 in its ongoing trial in adults. In October, it enrolled children between the ages of 11 and 17 to take part in a separate trial.
Moderna
This week Moderna announced it's going to begin testing its COVID-19 vaccine on 3,000 children between the ages of 12 and 17. Half will receive two doses of the vaccine one month apart, while the other half will get a placebo.
Johnson & Johnson/ Oxford AstraZeneca
There are no current trials underway in children here in the United States, but separate trials are being conducted in other parts of the world.
"I don't imagine that children will be included in the vaccinations until sometime toward the fall or winter of 2021," Dr. Goza said.
"We have to have those clinical trials because children aren't little adults. They may react to the vaccine differently."
The good news, according to many infectious disease experts, is that for the most part, they believe the vaccine will work equally as well in children as it will in adults because all of them contain genetic code for the protein found in coronavirus, prompting the body to produce antibodies against it.
"Our bodies can made antibodies against proteins at a few weeks of age," said Dr. Robert Frenck, Director of the Cincinnati Children's Hospital Vaccine Research Center.
"We really may not even need to modify the vaccine at all," he said.
