Uttam Maharjan

The COVID vaccine campaign has been going on in Nepal since January. However, the vaccines are being administered to people aged 18 and above. This implies that youngsters are at risk as they have not been vaccinated yet. The country has procured a little over 100,000 doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine for administration to younkers aged 12 and above. As the quantity is low, it has been decided to administer the doses to those with chronic diseases from November 14. The government is bringing in seven million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine and four million doses of the Moderna vaccine in the near future. These vaccines will be administered to children aged between 12 and 18. Research on administering the Moderna vaccine to over-fives is going on. The government is planning to administer the Moderna vaccine to such youngsters after it has been approved by the World Health Organisation.

In the USA, the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine has been approved for emergency use for children aged 5 to 11. As children are a vulnerable group, the vaccine was approved after expert panels at the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention and the Food and Drug Administration studied the risks and benefits of the vaccine. The USA is already administering the vaccine to children aged 12 to 15.

Effective vaccine
The paediatric vaccine needs to be sensitively designed. The vaccine for adults does not suit children. Research has shown that the newly designed vaccine is 91 per cent effective at preventing COVID-19 in children and that the immune response of children is comparable to that of people in the 16-25 age group. During the research, no side effects from the vaccine were reported. All these prove that the vaccine is safe for children. Research shows that the vaccine is 100 per cent effective at preventing the disease in the 12-15 age group and 91 per cent effective at preventing severe illness in people 16 and above. Early research shows that the vaccine is 96 per cent effective at preventing severe illness with COVID-19 caused by the Delta variant. The Delta variant is the most common variant in the USA.

The dose of the vaccine for children required is just one third of the adult dose. And smaller hypodermic needles are required. The second dose is administered three weeks after the first dose. However, the second dose can be administered up to six weeks after the first dose, if need be. Full vaccination is attained two weeks after the second dose.
Like adults, children can also contract and spread COVID-19. As per the Centres for Disease Prevention and Control, over 1.8 million children have contracted the disease and less than 200 of them have succumbed to the disease in the USA. In Nepal, over 100 children have died of the disease. If a child is vaccinated, he or she will not go down with severe illness even if he or she is infected with COVID-19. He or she will develop a mild illness and recover soon. He or she will also not spread the disease to others. Moreover, he or she can do things or go anywhere that might not have been possible if not vaccinated.

There may be controversy over administering COVID-19 vaccines to children. Some may oppose the idea, given their weak immune power and anatomy. However, it would be beneficial to vaccinate children and youngsters. Owing to the COVID-19 pandemic, the education sector has been badly hit in Nepal. Although online classes have been operated, not all teachers and students have been able to benefit from it for lack of access to technology. So, online classes have not been as effective as in-person classes. However, schools have gradually resumed.

As the trend of reopening schools is going on, students need to be vaccinated. For this, parents should also hold a positive attitude towards paediatric vaccination. They should realise that their children can give the infection to them and others. In fact, vaccine hesitancy is a serious challenge. There are still people in Nepal who oppose the vaccination, terming COVID-19 a fake disease or one propagandised for the benefit of pharmaceutical companies. However, more and more people are coming into the vaccination fold.

Storage facilities
The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine needs to be stored at minus 70 degrees Celsius. Unfortunately, Nepal does not have ultra-cold storage facilities. The country has four freezers provided by UNICEF. These freezers can store around 100,000 doses. But this is not adequate. The country should accelerate the drive for paediatric vaccination without delay. So the government should prioritise the construction of ultra-cold storage facilities. The COVID-19 pandemic is not over now. Although the infection rate is declining in Nepal, the disease is still there. We have not forgotten the dire situation when the second wave of the disease hit the country. We could not manage oxygen cylinders and oxygen concentrators. The active cases exceeded the 100,000 mark and there was a record of over 200 deaths a day at the time.

With more and more people getting inoculated, there is hope that the infection rate will come down to zero. To keep the hope alive, even children should be vaccinated. And people should still keep following health safety protocols like wearing masks, washing hands with sanitiser or soap and water, maintaining social distancing or avoiding crowds or gatherings. Negligence in following such protocols may make it difficult to prevent the spread of the disease. As the vaccine for children as young as five-year-olds has been approved in the USA, the government should take the initiative in vaccinating young children. The country can coordinate with the COVAX facility for this. The prevention of COVID-19 should always be in the priority list of the government. After all, nobody is safe until everybody is safe.

(Former banker, Maharjan has been regularly writing on contemporary issues for this daily since 2000. uttam.maharjan1964@gmail.com)