The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) expanded the eligibility for Pfizer-BioNTech booster doses to children of 12 to 15 years old amid a surge of Covid-19 infections in the US. The FDA also decreased the second Pfizer dose and the booster shot to five months.

“The recent surge in Covid-19 cases concerns to all and FDA’s decision will expand the emergency use of Pfizer booster dose to help in this pandemic. We continue to believe that boosters will provide a high level of protection against Covid-19 and will reduce the rate of hospitalisations,” Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla said in a statement.

The FDA said that no safety concerns had come after examining the real-world data from Israel on 6,300 kids aged 12 to 15 who received a Pfizer booster dose. There were no new cases in this age group. The FDA said that data from several laboratories say that Pfizer booster doses improve an individual’s antibody response to the Covid-19’s omicron variant. And giving a booster dose to people a month sooner can provide better protection against omicron, the agency said.