THE government will vaccinate adolescents who are at higher risk of severe Covid-19 due to chronic underlying medical conditions ahead of others, said Dr Adham Baba.

The health minister said healthy adolescents without underlying medical conditions who are at very low risk of serious Covid-19 may be offered vaccination, but at a later stage.

He said this was decided after taking into consideration results of an ongoing clinical trial using a lower dosage of the Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine in children, and real-world safety and efficacy data from countries using different time intervals between vaccine doses in young adults to see if this may be safer.

Adham said there was emerging evidence of post-vaccination myocarditis that indicated an association with the mRNA Covid-19 vaccines.

“Options to use inactivated vaccines should also be considered for adolescents once the safety and efficacy data is available for this age group,” said the health minister in his weekly media briefing today.

He said the Covid-19 Vaccine Candidate Selection Committee has also recommended the setting up of a system to monitor heart inflammation from mRNA vaccines.

He said the committee also recommended the reopening of schools.

When asked when the other healthy adolescents will be vaccinated, National Covid-19 Immunisation Programme Coordinating Minister Khairy Jamaluddin said priority is for those continuing their studies abroad.

“We are considering vaccinating the healthy adolescents after the adult vaccination is completed.

“The technical committee has also been asked to monitor those going to study abroad to see whether we will vaccinate them with Pfizer or Sinovac. But for now the priority is for the healthy adolescents who are going abroad to study,” said Khairy.

He said the government will only vaccinate those who are turning 18 this year.

“If they are 17 now but turning 18 this year, their parents will have to sign consent forms.”

More than 8,000 students going abroad have been scheduled to be vaccinated for now, he added.

As of June 29, 116,378 children have been confirmed positive for Covid-19 in Malaysia. Of those, 37,205 were in the 13 to 17 age group.

Although children accounted for 15% of the total Covid-19 cases, they tend to be asymptomatic or have milder symptoms and are less likely to develop severe illness.  

The estimated age-specific Infection Fatality Rate is very low for children and younger adults – 0.002% at age 10 and 0.01% at age 25.

In Malaysia, 70% of Covid-19 deaths occurred among those aged 60 and above, while for children, the distribution was 0.2% for those below 10 years’ old, and 10 to 19 years’ old respectively.

Based on the current National Pharmaceutical Regulatory Agency conditional approval status, only the Pfizer vaccine can be used for adolescents above 12 years.

The Pfizer vaccine is the first Covid-19 vaccine approved for children aged 12 to 15 by the United States Food and Drug Administration, the European Medicines Agency and the United Kingdom’s Modern Humanities Research Association in May 2021. – July 5, 2021.