Research based on the national study Overcoming COVID-19, led by Boston Children’s Hospital, and the hospital’s Taking On COVID-19 Together group, provides evidence that children who previously had COVID-19 19 (or the MIS-C inflammatory condition) are not protected. against the new variant of Omicron.
Vaccination, however, offers protection, according to the study. The findings, published in Nature Communications on May 27, run parallel to similar findings in adults.
“I hear parents say,‘ Oh, my son had COVID last year, ’” says Adrienne Randolph, MD, MSc, of Boston Children’s Hospital, which launched Overcoming COVID-19 in 2020. Randolph went to be the lead author of the current paper with Surender Khurana., PhD, of the Food and Drug Administration’s Viral Products Division, Center for Biological Assessment and Research. “But we found that antibodies produced by previous infections in children they don’t neutralize Omicron, which means that unvaccinated children are still susceptible to Omicron. “
The researchers obtained blood samples from 62 children and adolescents hospitalized with severe COVID-19, 65 children and adolescents hospitalized with MIS-C, and 50 outpatients who had recovered from mild COVID-19. All samples were taken during 2020 and early 2021, prior to the advent of the Omicron variant.
In the laboratory, they exposed the samples to a pseudovirus (derived from SARS-CoV-2, but stripped of its virulence) and measured the extent to which the antibodies in the samples were able to neutralize five different variants of SARS-CoV concern. CoV-2: Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta and Omicron.
In general, children and adolescents showed some loss of cross-neutralization of antibodies against all five variants, but the loss was more pronounced for Omicron.
Omicron is very different from the previous variants, with many mutations in the ear protein, and this work confirms that it is able to evade the antibody response. Unvaccinated children remain susceptible. “
Adrienne Randolph, MD, MSc, Boston Children’s Hospital
In contrast, children who had received two doses of the COVID-19 vaccine showed higher neutralizing antibody titers against all five variants, including Omicron.
Randolph hopes the data will encourage parents to vaccinate their children and teens. According to the CDC, only 28 percent of children ages 5 to 11 and only 58 percent of those ages 12 to 17 had received two doses of vaccine on May 18, 2022, figures that have barely changed since March. An FDA panel will meet on June 15 to consider the authorization of COVID-19 vaccines for children under 5 years of age.
Source:
Boston Children’s Hospital
Magazine reference:
Tang, J., et al. (2022) Cross-reactive immunity against the Omicron SARS-CoV-2 variant is low in pediatric patients with previous COVID-19 or MIS-C. Communications of nature. doi.org/10.1038/s41467-022-30649-1.