Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. archive photo. | Dado Ruvic

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The US Food & Drug Administration has already approved the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine for children aged 12-15 in America and now the pharmaceutical giant has formally asked the UK’s Regulatory Agency to allow it to be used in Britain, according to the Telegraph.

"We can confirm that the companies have submitted a request to the MHRA to expand the use of the Pfizer/BioNTech Covid vaccine to adolescents in the UK,” a Pfizer spokesperson told the paper.

But Professor Anthony Harden, Deputy Chairman of the Joint Committee on Vaccination & Immunisation, which advises who should be given the vaccine, is urging caution.

“Children are not little adults, you’ve still got safety considerations to look at quite carefully because they can respond differently to different pharmaceutical drug interventions,” he told the Telegraph. ”We can't be absolutely clear that just because it’s completely safe in adults it will be safe in children. We need to find that out from the data.”.

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The UK already has already bought 40 million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine and last month it managed to get its hands on an extra 60 million.

A trial showed that Pfizer had 100 per cent efficacy amongst 12 to 15-year-olds, one of the age groups considered most responsible for spreading Covid-19.

The JCVI will be closely watching the rollout of the Pfizer vaccine for teenagers in the US before recommending it be used in the UK.

Pfizer is also reportedly conducting trials of the vaccine in children who are six months to 11 years old.