2 doses of H1N1 vaccine for children under 9
Wednesday, September 23rd, 2009Washington: Younger children will need two doses of the vaccine against the new pandemic of A(H1N1) influenza, US officials said on Monday.
They said tests of Sanofi -Pasteur’s A(H1N1) flu vaccine showed children respond to it just as they do to seasonal flu vaccine, with children over 10 needing only a single dose but children under 9 needing two. Separately, Sanofi said it had won a US government order for 27.3 million more doses of its vaccine and AstraZeneca’s MedImmune unit said the US government has ordered 29 million more doses of its needle-free vaccine.
Dr Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said young children will likely need to have their doses 21 days apart. But he said they could receive seasonal flu shots and A(H1N1) shots on the same day – something that could ease the logistics of vaccinating children multiple times. “As we had hoped, in children the 2009 A(H1N1) vaccine is acting just like the seasonal flu vaccine,” Fauci told reporters in a telephone briefing.
Children aged 10 to 17 mounted an immune response that should protect them from A(H1N1) within 8 to 10 days, Fauci said. The US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention said 46 US children have died from A(H1N1), which appears to have first emerged in Mexico in March and which spread around the world to cause a pandemic in only six weeks.
A(H1N1) is now the dominant strain of influenza circulating globally and Fauci said it is possible it may replace the seasonal form of A(H1N1) also circulating. “If you look at the history of where new viruses come in, frequently what they do is come back the next year and displace one or even more than one of the circulating strains,” he said. “It is a distinct possibility that this might ultimately be incorporated into a seasonal flu vaccine.” – Reuters
