As vaccines to protect against the novel coronavirus continue to be administered across the country, one question remains unanswered — when will shots be approved for children and when will kids be vaccinated?
He said elementary school children in the U.S. would likely be ready to receive vaccinations by the first quarter of 2022 once studies on the safety of the vaccine are completed.
However, in Canada, no vaccines have been approved for use in children younger than 16 years of age.
Health Canada says it is waiting on data from the vaccine manufacturers before it approves any shot for use in children.
Here’s a closer look at what’s going on in Canada.
Vaccines approved
To date, Health Canada has approved four vaccines for use in Canada.
In December, the regulatory body approved two mRNA vaccines — one from Pfizer-BioNTech, the other from Moderna.
Last month, a shot from AstraZeneca was given the green light, and in early March, a shot from Johnson & Johnson was given the OK for use in Canada.
The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine can be used in anyone 16 and older, Health Canada says, while the other three shots have been approved for adults 18 and up.
By Saturday morning, 2,830,586 doses of the approved COVID-19 vaccines have been administered in Canada.
That means approximately 3.79 per cent of the country’s population is now vaccinated against the virus.
Trials underway
Speaking to reporters earlier this month after the approval of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, Health Canada’s chief medical advisor Dr. Supriya Sharma said a clinical trial to test the safety and efficacy of the vaccine in children aged 12 to 17 had been authorized by the agency.
“This will be important research to support vaccine availability for all Canadians of all ages,” she said.
Sharma said the clinical trial from Johnson & Johnson’s subsidiary, Janssen Pharmaceuticals, is the first trial Health Canada has authorized in younger adults that includes Canadian sites. It has not yet begun recruiting patients.
The other vaccine manufacturers are either looking into beginning clinical trials in children or have already started, Sharma confirmed.
“So the Pfizer and the Moderna vaccines, with respect to their clinical trials in younger-age adults — and that’s 12 to 15 for Pfizer, 12 to 17 for Moderna — have clinical trials that are ongoing, that actually finished recruiting patients into the clinical trials,” she continued. “So they’re the ones that are most far — they’re the furthest advanced in that.”
Sharma said AstraZeneca has also started a clinical trial to test its vaccine in younger age groups.
However, she said she expects Health Canada will receive data from Pfizer and Moderna first “because their trials in children are most advanced.”
In an email to Global News, Christina Antoniou, director of corporate affairs at Pfizer Canada, said the vaccine is being studied in children aged 12-15, “and the study is ongoing.”
She said as the results of the trial become available “we will share them with Health Canada.”
“At this point, I cannot confirm when that will be,” she wrote.
However, on Thursday, Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla said he expects younger teens to be eligible for the vaccine in the fall, and elementary school students by the end of the year.
Bourla said the company plans to submit the data for children between the ages of 12 and 16 very soon.
He added that data for children aged five to 11 can be expected year-end.
Global News also reached out to Moderna to determine when exactly the data from its trial would be shared with Health Canada, but did not hear back by publication.
Timeline?
Asked by reporters whether Health Canada could approve a vaccine for use in children before school begins in the fall of 2021, Sharma said that timeline “may be a bit optimistic.”
Montreal pediatric specialist answers questions about the coronavirus and kids
What to watch next
“So the trials in children tend to be a bit slower to get up and running in terms of recruiting individuals,” she said. “And then, of course, we have to conduct the trials and then take that information and assess that.”
She said it’s “not inconceivable that we might have some data in the summer.”
“And potentially by the end of this calendar year, we might have some indications in children, but … that’s still pretty optimistic.”
She said Health Canada is not expecting results from the Jannsen clinical trial until 2022.
“So potentially by the end of the calendar year we might have some answers for children, but it really will depend on how those clinical trials are conducted and most importantly the results that we get from them,” she said.
In a previous interview with Global News, Dr. Karina Top, a pediatric and infectious disease physician at IWK Health Cente in Halifax and vaccine researcher at the Canadian Centre for Vaccinology, said children are lower on the priority list for COVID-19 vaccines because they have less severe outcomes when they contract the virus, and because they have a lower transmission rate.
“Fortunately, COVID is generally or almost always a very mild disease in children,” Top told Global News.
“And young children (don’t) contribute to the spread of COVID as much as adults or older age groups,” she continued. “So for that reason, the focus has been on vaccinating the older populations and then working our way down in age groups to protect the most vulnerable.”
The Canadian government says it will donate up to 200,000 vaccine doses to fight the mpox outbreak in Congo and other African countries.
It says the donated doses of Imvamune will come from Canada’s existing supply and will not affect the country’s preparedness for mpox cases in this country.
Minister of Health Mark Holland says the donation “will help to protect those in the most affected regions of Africa and will help prevent further spread of the virus.”
Dr. Madhukar Pai, Canada research chair in epidemiology and global health, says although the donation is welcome, it is a very small portion of the estimated 10 million vaccine doses needed to control the outbreak.
Vaccine donations from wealthier countries have only recently started arriving in Africa, almost a month after the World Health Organization declared the mpox outbreak a public health emergency of international concern.
A few days after the declaration in August, Global Affairs Canada announced a contribution of $1 million for mpox surveillance, diagnostic tools, research and community awareness in Africa.
On Thursday, the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention said mpox is still on the rise and that testing rates are “insufficient” across the continent.
Jason Kindrachuk, Canada research chair in emerging viruses at the University of Manitoba, said donating vaccines, in addition to supporting surveillance and diagnostic tests, is “massively important.”
But Kindrachuk, who has worked on the ground in Congo during the epidemic, also said that the international response to the mpox outbreak is “better late than never (but) better never late.”
“It would have been fantastic for us globally to not be in this position by having provided doses a much, much longer time prior than when we are,” he said, noting that the outbreak of clade I mpox in Congo started in early 2023.
Clade II mpox, endemic in regions of West Africa, came to the world’s attention even earlier — in 2022 — as that strain of virus spread to other countries, including Canada.
Two doses are recommended for mpox vaccination, so the donation may only benefit 100,000 people, Pai said.
Pai questioned whether Canada is contributing enough, as the federal government hasn’t said what percentage of its mpox vaccine stockpile it is donating.
“Small donations are simply not going to help end this crisis. We need to show greater solidarity and support,” he said in an email.
“That is the biggest lesson from the COVID-19 pandemic — our collective safety is tied with that of other nations.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
Canadian Press health coverage receives support through a partnership with the Canadian Medical Association. CP is solely responsible for this content.
HALIFAX – The Nova Scotia government says it could be months before it reveals how many people are on the wait-list for a family doctor.
The head of the province’s health authority told reporters Wednesday that the government won’t release updated data until the 160,000 people who were on the wait-list in June are contacted to verify whether they still need primary care.
Karen Oldfield said Nova Scotia Health is working on validating the primary care wait-list data before posting new numbers, and that work may take a matter of months. The most recent public wait-list figures are from June 1, when 160,234 people, or about 16 per cent of the population, were on it.
“It’s going to take time to make 160,000 calls,” Oldfield said. “We are not talking weeks, we are talking months.”
The interim CEO and president of Nova Scotia Health said people on the list are being asked where they live, whether they still need a family doctor, and to give an update on their health.
A spokesperson with the province’s Health Department says the government and its health authority are “working hard” to turn the wait-list registry into a useful tool, adding that the data will be shared once it is validated.
Nova Scotia’s NDP are calling on Premier Tim Houston to immediately release statistics on how many people are looking for a family doctor. On Tuesday, the NDP introduced a bill that would require the health minister to make the number public every month.
“It is unacceptable for the list to be more than three months out of date,” NDP Leader Claudia Chender said Tuesday.
Chender said releasing this data regularly is vital so Nova Scotians can track the government’s progress on its main 2021 campaign promise: fixing health care.
The number of people in need of a family doctor has more than doubled between the 2021 summer election campaign and June 2024. Since September 2021 about 300 doctors have been added to the provincial health system, the Health Department said.
“We’ll know if Tim Houston is keeping his 2021 election promise to fix health care when Nova Scotians are attached to primary care,” Chender said.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2024.
ST. JOHN’S, N.L. – Newfoundland and Labrador‘s chief medical officer is monitoring the rise of whooping cough infections across the province as cases of the highly contagious disease continue to grow across Canada.
Dr. Janice Fitzgerald says that so far this year, the province has recorded 230 confirmed cases of the vaccine-preventable respiratory tract infection, also known as pertussis.
Late last month, Quebec reported more than 11,000 cases during the same time period, while Ontario counted 470 cases, well above the five-year average of 98. In Quebec, the majority of patients are between the ages of 10 and 14.
Meanwhile, New Brunswick has declared a whooping cough outbreak across the province. A total of 141 cases were reported by last month, exceeding the five-year average of 34.
The disease can lead to severe complications among vulnerable populations including infants, who are at the highest risk of suffering from complications like pneumonia and seizures. Symptoms may start with a runny nose, mild fever and cough, then progress to severe coughing accompanied by a distinctive “whooping” sound during inhalation.
“The public, especially pregnant people and those in close contact with infants, are encouraged to be aware of symptoms related to pertussis and to ensure vaccinations are up to date,” Newfoundland and Labrador’s Health Department said in a statement.
Whooping cough can be treated with antibiotics, but vaccination is the most effective way to control the spread of the disease. As a result, the province has expanded immunization efforts this school year. While booster doses are already offered in Grade 9, the vaccine is now being offered to Grade 8 students as well.
Public health officials say whooping cough is a cyclical disease that increases every two to five or six years.
Meanwhile, New Brunswick’s acting chief medical officer of health expects the current case count to get worse before tapering off.
A rise in whooping cough cases has also been reported in the United States and elsewhere. The Pan American Health Organization issued an alert in July encouraging countries to ramp up their surveillance and vaccination coverage.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 10, 2024.
