US-based pharmaceutical company Moderna has begun testing the two-dose COVID-19 vaccine in young children to see if vaccines should be extended to people under 18 years of age. age.
The company will distribute the vaccine to approximately 6,750 children in the United States and Canada between the ages of six months and 12 years. The doses would take 28 days apart so that researchers can monitor the side effects of the vaccine and find out how effective it is.
The study is being conducted in collaboration with the National Institute for Allergies and Infectious Diseases, which helped Moderna develop the vaccine.
Moderna has been conducting a separate study on the safety and efficacy of the vaccine since December involving 3,000 children between the ages of 12 and 18 years.
In a related development, the Vietnamese government says its COVID-19 home vaccine called Nanocovax will be available before the end of this year. Vietnam has admitted more than 15,000 of its citizens with the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine this month, and is negotiating to buy more vaccines from Pfizer, Moderna, Johnson & Johnson and developer Sputnik V Russia.
Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced on Wednesday that the country will send around 8,000 doses of its supply of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine to nearby Papua New Guinea, which is fighting an ever-increasing spread growth of the disease. Prime Minister Morrison also called on the European Union and AstraZeneca to send one million doses of the vaccine to Papua New Guinea purchased by Canberra.
The EU recently banned more than 250,000 doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine for Australia to help make up for a severe shortage of vaccines in Europe, as well as Australia’s success in giving into the virus to a large extent.
Australian Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly told reporters that half of expectant mothers admitted to hospitals in the Port of Moresby capital have been positive for COVID-19. Kelly said large numbers of frontline health care workers have also contracted the virus.
Morrison says all travel between Australia and Papua New Guinea has been suspended.