Aditi Tandon

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, November 24

With several countries rushing to expand Covid-19 vaccination to cover children, the World Health Organisation (WHO) on Wednesday said countries should prioritise global sharing of vaccines to cover low inoculation nations before proceeding to vaccinate children.

India’s National Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation is to meet in November-end to take a call on whether to expand the national Covid inoculation drive to cover children.

“As a matter of global equity, as long as many parts of the world are facing extreme vaccine shortages, countries that have achieved high vaccine coverage in their high-risk populations should prioritise global sharing of Covid-19 vaccines before vaccinating children and adolescents who are at low risk for severe disease,” the WHO said in an interim statement today.

No vax for kids yet

It noted that some countries, including the US and India, had approved vaccines for children. The WHO has not yet approved any Covid-19 vaccine for emergency use in children although it has seven vaccines, including Covaxin, on the EUL (emergency use listing) for adults.

Pfizer and Moderna’s Covid-19 shots have been approved for use in 12-17 age group. India has given approval to ZycovD, a novel DNA vaccine, for this age group but the vaccine has yet to receive EUL.

“Several Covid-19 vaccines are undergoing trials in younger age groups (as young as 6 months), but results have not yet been published,” the WHO said, effectively asking countries to put child Covid vaccinations on hold. The world body said the greatest burden of severe disease and deaths remained among older persons and those with co-morbidities and the global vaccination strategy targets remained the same – 40 per cent of each country’s population by 2021-end and 70 per cent by mid-2022.