Singapore is making progress in its children vaccination trials.

Health Minister Ong Ye Kung announced this during the press conference today.

Ong also revealed that KK Women's and Children's Hospital (KKH) will be overseeing the vaccine trials for children.

He also noted that the purpose of the trial is to smoothen operations once the vaccination roll-out is carried out at scale, as young children are involved.

KKH is planning to start recruitment for the first batch of participants.

"So if your child is between five and 11 years old, you can find out from the KKH's website and Facebook page, more about the study as well as the registration details, and this will be available by end of this week", he said.

Children under 12 a group of concern

From Nov. 8 to Nov. 14, there were 1,765 cases involving children less than 12 years of age, said MOH's director of medical services Kenneth Mak.

This represents about 10 per cent of the total number of cases reported to MOH over the same time period, and is a slight increase in the number from 1,667 in the week before.

Mak said that this group remains a group of concern because MOH have not been able to offer them vaccination under the national vaccination programme.

The Expert Committee on Covid-19 Vaccination is finalising its recommendations on vaccination for children between the ages of five and 12 years using the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine.

Even though children usually have a mild infection and make full recoveries, Mak said it would be "complacent" to assume this will be the situation for all children infected with Covid-19.

Ong also said that MOH has also signed a new supply agreement with Pfizer, which includes deliveries of paediatric vaccines. And that Singapore is in contact with Pfizer, who will try to fulfil the deliveries as soon as possible.

Top photo via Charles Deluvio, Daniel Schludi/Unsplash.