European Medicines Agency assessing Pfizer shot for youngsters 12 to 15

BRUSSELS (AFP): The EU’s medicines watchdog said Tuesday it has started to evaluate Pfizer/BionTech’s coronavirus vaccine to booster children aged 12 to 15 years.

The European Medicines Agency last week said it would rule soon on a similar application to give the booster jab, called Comirnaty, to teens aged 16 and 17 within the 27-nation bloc.

“EMA has started evaluating an application for the use of a booster dose of Comirnaty in adolescents aged 12 to 15 years,” the Amsterdam-based agency said.

“An application in older adolescents aged 16 to 17 years is also ongoing,” it added in a statement.

The EMA last October approved Comirnaty booster jabs for all people aged 18 and older, followed by a similar decision to back Moderna’s Spikevax shortly afterwards.

The EMA’s head of vaccines strategy Marco Cavaleri last week said it was unlikely there would be a decision to approve two vaccines produced by French firms Valneva and Sanofi Pasteur — both currently under rolling review — before Easter. 

But he added that vaccination — in particular booster jabs — “remained the best form of protection against serious illness from the Omicron variant of the virus”.