Babies with underlying health conditions are set to be offered a Covid vaccine, UK health chiefs confirmed.
Two Pfizer jabs will be offered to around 60,000 infants aged six months to four years.
Conditions include poorly controlled asthma and issues affecting the heart, kidneys, liver or digestive system.
Covid poses a small threat to the vast majority of children, but some are at risk of contracting a more serious illness.
Babies are to be offered the vaccine for the first time
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The Government’s vaccine task force insist the move is the “best way to increase their protection”.
Jabs will be rolled out in mid-June, and patients should wait to be contacted before coming forward, officials have advised.
New UK health Security Agency (UKHSA) data suggests that 51 under-fours have died of Covid since the start of the pandemic.
This figure could be a slight overestimate as it includes anyone who has tested positive for the virus within four weeks of dying.
Children who have recently contracted the virus should not be jabbed until at least four weeks later, the JCVI advised
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The report, published today by the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation, said eligible youngsters should be offered two three-microgram doses of the Pfizer Covid jab, at least eight weeks apart.
Children who have recently contracted the virus should not be jabbed until at least four weeks later, they advised.
Third doses are in the offing for those in the group who are immunosuppressed, with further advise to be issued “in due course”.
Children in the age group who are not affected by any of the underlying health issues are not currently eligible, the JCVI said.
The JCVI’s Covid-19 Committee chair Professor Wei Shen Lim said: “For the vast majority of infants and children, Covid causes only mild symptoms, or sometimes no symptoms.
“However, for a small group of children with pre-existing health conditions it can lead to more serious illness, and for them, vaccination is the best way to increase their protection.”
Health Secretary Steve Barclay commented: “Children are at very low risk of harm from Covid.
“However, there are a very small number of children with health conditions which make them particularly vulnerable, and for those children we want to give parents the choice as to whether they wish to vaccinate their at-risk child or not.
“I have accepted advice from the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation on vaccinating children aged from six months to four years who are in a clinical risk group.
“It is a parental decision, and this advice is simply to enable parents of children with medical conditions to choose if they wish to have the protection”