NEW YORK (1010 WINS) – Rutgers University will enroll as many as 200 children to take part in a vaccine trial for the Pfizer/BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine, officials said.
Rutgers announced Thursday that it had been selected as a clinical trial site for the global research study, which will evaluate the efficacy of the two-dose vaccine in children.
The trial site at the Pediatric Clinical Research Center at Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School in New Brunswick is one of several sites for the pediatric study.
Children between 6 months and 11 years old will take part in the trial, the university said. That will include up to 100 children ages 5 to 12, 50 children ages 2 to 5 and 50 children ages 6 months to 2 years.
In all, 4,644 children are set to be enrolled worldwide. The trial aims to see if vaccinated children have lower rates of infection with moderate to severe symptoms compared to unvaccinated kids over a period of two years.
As part of the trial, participants will be randomly selected to receive the two-dose shot or a placebo. Six months later, they’ll find out if they received the vaccine or the placebo. Those who received the placebo will be offered the vaccine.
“Children can get sick from COVID-19 and can spread the virus to others even if they are asymptomatic. While most children experience mild or no symptoms, some children can get severely ill and could have long-term effects,” said co-lead investigator Simon Li, an associate professor of pediatrics at Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School.
“Maximizing COVID-19 vaccination in all age groups is important to stop the global progression of the disease. Vaccination will also help us feel safer about our children resuming school and daily activities,” Li said.
Pediatricians and parents who are interested in their children being considered for the vaccine trial can fill out a questionnaire at rutgers.edu.
Rutgers has already served as a vaccine trial site twice. Last fall, trials for the Moderna and Johnson & Johnson vaccines were conducted there.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is expected to authorize Pfizer's vaccine for children ages 12 to 15 by next week, a federal official and a person familiar with the process told the Associated Press on Monday.
The announcement is set to come a month after the company found that its shot, which is already authorized for people age 16 and older, also provided protection for the younger group.
On Wednesday, Canadian health officials said they had become the first to approve Pfizer’s vaccine for ages as young as 12.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Related
