Montevideo Portal
The Ministry of Public Health (MSP) published on Monday a technical report on vaccination against covid-19 in pediatric population aged 5 to 11 years. The portfolio explained that the increase in coverage in the different age groups plus the variants that emerged, influenced substantial changes in the epidemiological profile of the infection, which began to affect the susceptible strata, which include the vaccinated population and groups not included so far in the vaccination strategy, within which is the population aged between 5 and 11 years.
“Initially, the infection in children presented a lower rate of contagiousness, making them infrequent as an index case and placing them at the end of the transmission chain. As the coverage of the different age groups increased and with the entry of the delta variant of concern (currently predominant in Uruguay), a percentage increase in cases in children from 10 to 34% of the total number of children has been evidenced in recent weeks. cases, with the group with the highest percentage being between 5 and 11 years old. Infections occur mainly at the school and intrafamily level, for the month of October 2021 each child under 12 years of age generated an average of 1.2 cases of COVID-19, ”the report states.
As published by the MSP, the clinical manifestations of covid-19 in the pediatric population vary from asymptomatic symptoms, mild disease, moderate disease and more severe manifestations such as pediatric multisystemic inflammatory syndrome, which can occur during or after the disease course , even in children who have the infection asymptomatically and require specialized care.
“As in adults, children can also present the post-COVID / long COVID syndrome, which is manifested by the persistence of respiratory symptoms, sleep disorders, depression and loss of smell, in addition to cognitive disorders that can compromise learning . It is estimated that 9.8% of children between the ages of 2 and 11 with a diagnosis of COVID-19 have symptoms 5 weeks after infection and 7.4% have symptoms up to 12 weeks after infection. The absenteeism product of school closings, as well as isolation due to the need to contain outbreaks, is a limitation for the bio-psycho-social development of children ”, they add.
The report indicates that the following diseases are considered as risk groups: Down syndrome; chronic lung disease (moderate to severe asthma, bronchiectasis, bronchopulmonary dysplasia, COPD, interstitiopathies, cystic fibrosis, pulmonary hypertension); Chronic Kidney Disease; epilepsy, neuromuscular diseases, diseases that alter cognitive ability or self-care such as autism spectrum disorders and other developmental disorders, multiple sclerosis, Huntington’s disease; diabetes; obesity; primary immunodeficiencies, HIV, oncological and hemato-oncological diseases, thalassemia, sickle cell disease, people with solid organ transplants or hematopoietic progenitors, children receiving treatment with immunosuppressive drugs (for example, high-dose corticosteroids); cardiovascular disease / heart disease; tuberculosis; chronic liver disease; inborn errors of metabolism.
Regarding whether or not vaccines are safe for children in this age group, the MSP assures in the report that studies so far show that vaccines approved by international agencies are “safe.” They justified that they will inoculate children with the Pfizer / BioNTech vaccine with evidence from phase II and III studies that evaluated different factors such as safety and efficacy in a total of 4,647 children, of whom 3,109 received the vaccine and the rest received placebo.
“Healthy children were included and also a group of children who had previously suffered from SARS-CoV-2 infection, a group of children with stable chronic diseases who had no changes in treatment, hospitalization or worsening of the disease in the 6 weeks prior to entry to the study and who had not previously presented the multisystemic inflammatory syndrome, and who did not have immunodeficiencies. The efficacy found was 90.7% to prevent symptomatic disease. This also included efficacy against cases of the delta variant ”, they explained.
“The adverse effects found were similar to those found in the adolescent group and included: pain and redness at the injection site, headache, fever, tiredness and muscle aches; most adverse events were mild-moderate and no myocarditis was reported in this study. In adolescents and young adults after the Pfizer / BioNTech vaccine, some cases of myocarditis and pericarditis were reported very infrequently, which, unlike myocarditis and pericarditis that can be caused by viruses, including SARS-CoV-2, were limited and with good evolution. These adverse effects of special interest were evaluated very specially ”, they emphasize.
“Given this background, the benefits of applying this vaccine outweigh the risks for this population, especially in those children with risk factors for severe COVID-19. As in the entire vaccination campaign against COVID-19, it is essential that the monitoring and surveillance of adverse effects that may occur after the start of administration to children between 5 and 11 years old continue ”, they added.
On this matter, the text of the document finally indicates that vaccination with the aforementioned risk groups will begin, on a non-mandatory basis, with a date to be defined and the vaccination will not imply a limitation to any activity in this age group.
Finally, the text clarifies that the Pfizer / BioNTech covid-19 vaccine “should not be given” to people with a known history of severe allergic reaction, anaphylaxis, for example, to any component of the vaccine.
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