Europe's medicines regulator on Friday backed the use of Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine for children as young as 12, paving the way for a broader roll-out in the region after similar clearances in the United States and Canada. The European Medicines Agency's endorsement comes weeks after it began evaluating extending use of the vaccine, developed with Germany's BioNTech, to include 12- to 15-year-olds. It is already being used in the European Union for those aged 16 and older. It is now up to individual EU states to decide if and when to offer the vaccine to teenagers, it added. Paediatrics professor Ruediger von Kries has said the vaccine might only be called for in children with particular health risks, citing a lack of data on long-term side effects.

Source: dna May 28, 2021 16:30 UTC