Belgium to start vaccinating 16- and 17 year-olds in July

Teens aged 16 and 17 will be invited to receive their COVID-19 vaccine in Belgium from July on, the country’s health ministry said Monday.

The Interministerial Conference (CIM) on Public Health, which includes federal Health Minister Frank Vandenbroucke, said it had agreed in principle to vaccinating 16- and 17-year-olds, “according to the modalities to be developed by the Task Force.”

The BioNTech/Pfizer vaccine was approved for use for those aged 16 and over in January in Europe. On May 28, the European Medicines Agency extended the conditional marketing authorization to 12 to 15-year-olds.

At the start of the year, teens in this age group were invited for vaccination if they were trainees in nursing homes. Starting in July, those aged 16 to 17 who are most at risk will be vaccinated as a priority, the health ministry said.

The ministry said the CIM is also studying the possibility of allowing duly informed younger adults to opt for the Johnson & Johnson or Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccines instead. That would mark a change to its current policy, which has restricted the J&J vaccine to those over 41 and the AstraZeneca vaccine to those over 56 in light of the rare but serious side effect of thrombosis and thrombocytopenia.