Today, kids as young as 6 months old are taking part in trials for both companies’ vaccines with their parent’s consent. Dr. Zinaida Good, a research fellow at the Stanford cancer center, enrolled both her sons in Stanford Hospital’s Pfizer trial.
“We thought participating is a really good way to protect our kids,” she said. “So far, because this vaccine has been tested in a lot of teenagers and so many adults and it was shown [to be] very safe, we felt pretty comfortable to participate.”
Her son Soren is one of the youngest in Stanford Hospital’s Pfizer trial at only 7 months old. He received his first shot last week. Good says he’s doing well.
COVID-19 Vaccine Trials Enroll Younger Children
The trials will test whether the shot is safe and effective for children.
“Children under 18 make up 85 million people in the U.S. about 20% of the population,” Yvonne Maldonado, MD, a pediatric infectious diseases researcher at Stanford University, told ABC News.
“Getting them vaccinated is a major contribution to reducing transmission of the virus,” she said.
Public health officials also see vaccination in children as a key to reaching full herd immunity in the U.S. More than 142 million people have received at least one dose of a vaccine, according to the latest CDC tally updated on Wednesday. That represents about 43% of the total population.
What Do the COVID Vaccine Dosing Trial Phases Look Like?
Both drug companies are following a similar dosing trial structure with the goal of allowing researchers to determine how much vaccine children can tolerate and if it will still adequately protect them at that dosage.
For Moderna s clinical trial, which was expected to enroll 6,750 healthy children in the United States and Canada, each infant and child receives two shots, 28 days apart. Unlike in adult studies, this trial will be completed in two phases. In the first part, children between 2 years and 12 years will receive two doses of 50 or 100 micrograms each. Infants and children under two years old will receive two shots of 25, 50, or 100 micrograms.