While a lot of us watch and wait for a coronavirus vaccine, a new report says our kids may have to wait even longer.
Let’s connect the dots.
Coronavirus vaccines for adults are already in advanced clinical trials. But all of those trials are only looking at if they are safe and effective in adults not children.
According to a report in the New York Times, once trials for kids start it could take a year to get COVID-19 vaccines ready for them.
So how does this usually work? Many vaccines are actually designed for children— think measles and polio vaccines. When researchers start developing vaccine markers, they start testing in adults first.
If they don’t find any serious safety issues, they then move on to testing in children. Often they begin their tests on teenagers and work down to younger ages. All of this is time, research require informed consent from parents.
A group of pediatricians published an open letter in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases calling on vaccine makers to start focusing on kids.
However, experts say there is a good reason they focused on adults first; namely, children are less likely to die from COVID-19. Right now, critics are concerned if work doesn’t begin soon a vaccine for kids won’t be ready until fall of 2021.
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