The drug safety agency has embarked on a preliminary review of clinical data to consider whether the minimum age for the Novavax vaccine should be lowered to people aged twelve and older.
 
Currently, Novavax is administered to those 18 years old and above.
 
The Ministry of Food and Drug Safety(MFDS) said on Wednesday it is examining relevant data to decide on a possible change to the vaccine's age limit.
 
South Korea’s SK bioscience is manufacturing the protein-based vaccine created by the U.S. pharmaceutical company under a licensing agreement as a local partner.
 
SK bioscience had submitted data to the MFDS, showing results of U.S. clinical tests conducted on two-thousand-247 people aged between 12 and 17.
 
According to the biotech firm, the effectiveness of preventing COVID-19 was 79-point-five percent for teenagers who were double-jabbed with the Novavax vaccine. The percentage is similar to that of adults. For the delta variant, the efficacy reached 82 percent.
 
SK bioscience expects the vaccine will serve as a new alternative, as infections among teenagers have been rapidly increasing.