London:
A new study has revealed that the side effects of the Pfizer-BioNTech jab against COVID-19 in 12-15-year-olds at higher danger of complications from the infection are most likely to be mild to moderate and clear up promptly simply because of particular coexisting circumstances.
The findings of the study have been published in the journal ”Archives of Disease in Childhood”.
Although the study numbers are smaller, the information are representative of these teens most most likely to advantage from the vaccination, and need to present reassurance to parents and clinicians, mentioned the authors.
Healthy children with COVID-19 infection usually have a mild illness, but some coexisting circumstances, especially neurological circumstances, are linked with serious illness.
These higher-danger children have been as a result shielded to cut down their danger of infection, and wouldn”t have been integrated in early vaccine security research, mentioned the authors.
The UK’s vaccine advisory group, the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI), advised that children aged 12 and more than with serious neurological disabilities, who have a tendency to get recurrent respiratory infections and have complicated care wants, need to be supplied the COVID-19 jab.
Given the unknown side effects of vaccination in this complicated and vulnerable group, the authors asked the parents of 27 of these children to record any side effects of subsequent COVID-19 vaccinations for each and every youngster.
The children have been aged involving 12 and 15 3 have been hospital inpatients 16 have been boys and most (21) have been white.
They had many neurological circumstances, which includes muscular dystrophy and cerebral palsy, plus a variety of coexisting healthcare circumstances, such as epilepsy, congenital heart defects, and immune deficiency, for which they have been getting drug remedy of many types.
The reported side effects have been all mild to moderate, except for one youngster who skilled serious fatigue and discomfort, combined with elevated agitation.
One family also reported that seizure form changed to clusters, despite the fact that this had resolved a week later.
In all, there have been 8 ”events” in 6 children immediately after the 1st dose, all of which resolved inside 72 hours: mild rash headache diarrhoea presumed sore throat neck discomfort difficulty sleeping and low blood glucose.
After the second dose, 8 further events occurred in 5 children: diarrhoea vomiting armpit swelling and blisters about the mouth.
Paracetamol use immediately after the 1st dose was higher and fever was more popular than reported in research of adults (13 per cent vs 4 per cent in 16-55-year-olds). But all recorded side effects cleared up inside a week.
“Numbers were small, but these data are especially important as they are representative of the children who are most likely to benefit from vaccination, and parents and clinicians may have concerns regarding an increased risk of unexpected events,” noted the authors.
“The parents choosing to take up this vaccination at a time when it was off-licence, with little available safety data, did so because they (and their clinicians) believed their children to be at high risk of COVID-19 disease. Indeed, many had been shielding and felt that vaccination would make a significant difference to their lives,” the authors concluded.
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