First locality to roll out COVID-19 shots for children aged 5-11

The Ministry of Health has authorized the emergency use of Moderna COVID-19 vaccine (Spikevax) and Pfizer/BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine (Comirnaty) for children in this age group.

The Government of Australia committed to gift Viet Nam with seven million doses of Moderna vaccine to help the Southeast Asian country expand vaccine coverage to children in this age group. The first batch of the vaccine arrived in Viet Nam last weekend.

Deputy Director of the National Institute of Hygiene and Epidemiology Duong Thi Hong recommended parents keep close watch on their children within three days to monitor the post-vaccine reactions. 

Viet Nam has around 11.8 million children aged 5 to under 12, of them about 8.2 million children are thought to have yet been infected with COVID-19, according to Deputy Director of the Preventive Medicine Administration under the Ministry of Health, Phan Trong Lan.  

Deputy Minister of Health Nguyen Truong Son said that 19.2 percent of total infections in the country are children under 18 years old.

Specifically, 4.8 percent are children aged 13-17; about 8 percent aged 6-12; 2.8 percent aged 3-5 and 3.6 percent under three.

The number of child deaths from COVID-19 is 165, accounting for 0.42 percent of the nation's death toll./.