Hanoi (VNA) – The extensive vaccination ofchildren aged 12 and above helps reduce disease burden and the risk of newvariant emergence, potentially by reducing viral transmission, Dr Kidong Park,WHO Representative in Vietnam, said in an interview with Vietnam News Agencyreporters.

Park spoke highly of the Vietnamese Ministry of Health’s vaccination scheme,saying that “the Ministry of Health emphasises the importance of acceleratingvaccination for adults as first priority, especially the health workers, olderpeople, and those with co-morbidities.”

This is in line with WHO recommendations, he stressed.

Regarding the ministry officially allowing COVID-19vaccinations in children aged 12-17, with those aged 16-17 to get the shotsfirst, the WHO official said extensive vaccination of children 12 years old andabove will reduce disease burden and the risk of new variant emergence,potentially by reducing viral transmission.

According to Park, WHO has granted Emergency Use Listing(EUL) to Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine COVID-19 vaccine for use in adolescents(children above the age of 12).

WHO is urging manufacturers who have completed data on theirvaccines to submit the data to WHO for review to increase vaccine availabilityfor children and adolescents, he said.

As adolescents and children with comorbidities are also atsignificantly higher risk of serious COVID-19 disease, they may be offeredvaccination, he said, while calling on everybody to continue to implement the5K and the other public health interventions.

In addition, children should be guided to inform parents orcaregivers if he/she feels sick. Individual prevention measures of adults arealso important in protecting children, preventing the transmission of the virusfrom family members, he added.

Studies are ongoing regarding the frequency and risk ofCOVID-19 in children and adolescents, he went on.

“We know that children and adolescents of allages can become infected and transmit the virus; however, developing evidencesuggests that younger children may be less susceptible and children, ingeneral, are less likely to suffer from severe disease and death followingCOVID-19 infection compared with other age groups.

“The recently released GlobalVaccination Strategy has included adolescents (children above the age of 12) asa key group in achieving 70 percent vaccination coverage. Therefore, once allhigh risk groups are fully vaccinated, vaccination of adolescents (those ages12 and above) can be done to reduce disease burden and the risk of new variantemergence,” Park affirmed./.