Should our younger children get vaccinated?

The Department of Health is scaling up its vaccination drive – with Children between the ages of 12 – 17 this October 2021.

Why? And Why not? Know the facts. We chat to Dr Angelique Coetzee, President of the South African Medical Association.

Brought to you by Fedhealth Medical Aid – We let you be you. Also supported by Epi-max and Jacaranda 94.2.

Doctor Angelique Coetzee in conversation with Elana about vaccines for children

Doctor: From a medical professional point of view why? Yes, especially the ones who are suffering from chronic diseases like kidney problems, kidney failure, immune response diseases, HIV so anything that can bring down your immune response, those children are really at the forefront, and they should be vaccinated. Then you also would like to vaccinate your grade 11 and grade 12's because they need to carry on with their lives, they need to finish school, they need to do their exams as well as the grade 7's, they need to get out of primary school and go on to high school. So those are the kids that you would really love to get vaccinated. 

Elana: Doctor, it's such a crazy time that we're living in, I mean this morning I learned that one of my family members have passed on from Covid, I am not the only one in this kind of reality. It was this week in this studio where we realized okay, so there's two vaccines that exist. For children at the time, they called it, then they changed the speak to kids, then we realized okay it's for teenagers. What do you know about the vaccine that's available that most of our children/teenagers in my case are already registering for?

Doctor: So, it is important to understand that currently there is only one vaccine approved for children above the age of 12 up until 17 and that is the Pfizer vaccine. There is no other vaccine. There's a study being going on with a company where they need 2 000 participants but that's something different. That's not the same as the Pfizer vaccine and the process that we are now talking about. So, I think it's important to understand that to start off with. So, Pfizer is the one that is being recommended and approved by SAHPRA for current use of children. 

Elana: Why are we so scared and unsure? A lot of people on our Whatsapp line when I did my own little survey with just people from this studio. A lot of parents said we are scared of the one case that was confirmed of possible heart disease with two vaccines. Why are we terrified and why should we get vaccinated? 

Doctor: I think the reason why we are terrified is that there is not enough information. There's a lack of information and there's a lot of fake news out there, so first of all just to come back to the single dose, because in South Africa we  have a SAHPRA approved a single dose of Pfizer, we know that in America they have two doses of Pfizer. SAHPRA feels that the single dose does provide some protection against infection and possibly more so in young people, and it is also possible that many of these young people already have antibodies especially after the third wave, so a single dose will be highly immunogenic and protective, and it's important to understand that and then as with any other countries and that we have seen, remember again the United States and some of the first world countries, other European countries have already started to vaccinate the kids above the age of 12 and the very rare side effect of Myocarditis and I think this is what is scaring most of the people.  It's about 10 to 40 people out of a million and it's normally those 10 to 40 out of a million was seen in men under the age of 30 and above the age of 15 years. So, it is extremely rare, and it did occur most frequently after the second dosage, so that is also one of the reasons why SAHPRA says, let's go at this stage with the evidence that we have for now with only one dose. So, I also need to stress that the risk of Myocarditis with Covid infection compared to this to those without Covid infection is 18 times higher. So, the risk benefit remains very favourable, and we have seen it in the third wave, we have seen a lot of people got Myocarditis some of them still suffering from the side effects of the Myocarditis after they got Covid 19. So, I think it's important to see it in this context. 

Elana: So just for clarity, as a mom, Myocarditis; what does that mean in short. What is it?

Doctor: Myocarditis is where you get palpitations, real palpitations. The pulse rate goes up to above 100, it's more or less about 130 or anything between 105 and 130 when they are at rest, and this is what we have seen during Covid. When they rest and they do nothing, the pulse rate gets lower than 100. The moment when they get up and they walkaround they get tiredness and then they get these palpitations as I've said. It’s real palpitations it's not, I feel that my heart is beating fast, we can prove it and it's easy to monitor it's on an oxygen meter. You know this little gadget that you put on your finger so that it can measures it. Normally with the side effects for those 10 to 40 out of a million that will most probably be males above the age of 15 that will get Myocarditis or most probably get Myocarditis after a second vaccine. Remember we're only going to get one vaccine for Pfizer it normally takes about a week to resolve spontaneously. They didn't give any treatment as far as we are aware of according to the studies. So, no one died from Myocarditis that we are aware of. 

Elana: For our younger children uh should they get vaccinated? From a medical professional point of view, why?

Doctor: Yes, especially the ones who are suffering from chronic diseases, kidney failure, immune response diseases, HIV, so anything that can bring down your immune response, those children are really at the forefront, and they should be vaccinated. Then you also would like to vaccinate your grade 11 and grade 12’ because they need to carry on with their lives they need to finish school, they need to do their exams as well as the grade 7s. They need to get out of primary school and go on to high school, so those are the kids that you would really love to  get vaccinated. So, the problem arises that when you then say I'm only going to vaccinate those children, then you will have people or parents saying but why is my child not being vaccinated. My child wants to be vaccinated, so it's been opened up and that is the idea, that's the children that really needs to be vaccinated.

Elana: What if mom feels that I'd rather have my child get Covid instead of being vaccinated? Is that an option? From a medical point of view, why don't we go that route? 

Doctor: It's not really an option, we know that children don't really get that sick from Covid 19 but you never, never know whether you might be the exception, so you don't want your child, so the other thing is  the new studies that we have seen, is it seems to us that the natural immunity also wanes down and the studies are showing a later study that was published, said that after about five months you start to lose your immunity and they predict that within two years (18 months I think was the period), about 50% of your immunity will be lost.

Elana: My neighbour’s child had a vaccine, and she doesn't feel well (I'm making this up for the sake of this interview because we're not sure when this viewer will be watching this), so what is your comment on that?

Doctor: So, the side effects for the children are exactly for the same for adults. You get the redness at the arm, it can be painful you can have a little bit of body aches and pains and you can take Panado, you can take anything, you know Lotum or whatever or Mypaid Forte, depends on your age group. So, you can't get sick from the vaccine. There's no ways that the vaccine can give you Covid.

Elana: I had a question that just popped up. Immunity among children like with measles, what's your opinion?

Doctor: It's not the same as measles and we don't have all the studies that we have on measles and we don't have the data on how long your immune response will last, as I've said and referred to this in one article, which actually shows us that your immune response with natural immunity is going to wane down and we also know that even with the vaccines, it can also wane down but the ideal will be if you had Covid before, and you vaccinate, that's what primes your immune system and you would love your body to remember what it's been exposed to, so that when you get it in the future again you would have a proper response. Also remember that we don't know the variance and whether you would have immunity against the new variance, we don't know. 

Elana: Doctor thanks your time you're incredible and thanks for giving us accurate facts. We wish you only the best, thanks for being on the front line and for giving us information that's accurate and wonderful, thanks your time.

Doctor: Thank you and please don't be afraid. Thank you.