Pfizer and BioNTech seek FDA EUA for COVID-19 vaccine to include children younger than 5
Following a request from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), Pfizer and BioNTech initiated a rolling submission to amend the emergency use authorization (EUA) of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine to include children 6 months through 4 years of age, Pfizer announced in a news release.
The application is for authorization of the first two 3 µg doses of a planned three-dose primary series in this age group. Data on a third dose given at least 8 weeks after completion of the second dose are expected in the coming months and will be submitted to the FDA to support a potential expansion of this requested EUA.
Since the pandemic began, more than 10.6 million children have tested positive for COVID-19 in the U.S.,1 with children under 4 accounting for more than 1.6 million of those cases. Further, reported COVID-19 cases and related hospitalization among children have spiked dramatically across the United States during the Omicron variant surge. For the week ending January 22, children under 4 accounted for 3.2% of the total hospitalizations due to COVID-19.
“As hospitalizations of children under 5 due to COVID-19 have soared, our mutual goal with the FDA is to prepare for future variant surges and provide parents with an option to help protect their children from this virus,” said Albert Bourla, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Pfizer. “Ultimately, we believe that three doses of the vaccine will be needed for children 6 months through 4 years of age to achieve high levels of protection against current and potential future variants. If two doses are authorized, parents will have the opportunity to begin a COVID-19 vaccination series for their children while awaiting potential authorization of a third dose.”
The Phase 1/2/3 trial initially enrolled 4,500 children ages 6 months to under 12 years of age in the United States, Finland, Poland, and Spain from more than 90 clinical trial sites. Additional children have been enrolled in all age groups following study amendments and the trial currently includes approximately 8,300 children. It was designed to evaluate the safety, tolerability, and immunogenicity of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine on a two-dose schedule (approximately 21 days apart) in three age groups: ages 5 to under 12 years; ages 2 to under 5 years; and ages 6 months to under 2 years.
Based on the Phase 1 dose-escalation portion of the trial, children ages 5 to under 12 years received a two-dose schedule of 10 µg each while children under age 5 received a lower 3-µg dose for each injection in the Phase 2/3 study. The trial enrolled children with or without prior evidence of SARS-CoV-2 infection. On December 17, 2021, Pfizer and BioNTech announced the companies would test a third 3-µg dose given at least two months after the second dose in children under age 5 and a third dose of the 10-µg formulation in children 5 to under 12 years of age.
