Child Covid vaccinations: Your questions answered

A low-dose Covid vaccine will be offered to children aged between five and 11 in England, the government says.

Northern Ireland has said it will also follow Wales and Scotland in offering the vaccine to young children.

Our health correspondents Smitha Mundasad and Philippa Roxby answer some of your questions:

The benefits of vaccination are likely to apply mainly to a future wave of infection.

And we don’t know exactly when the next wave will come or how severe it will be.

Most healthy children don’t get seriously ill with Covid-19, but some do.

With this in mind, families can choose to take the pediatric dose for their 11-year-old as long as their children are eligible – as it offers some protection relatively quickly.

Experts advise children to get vaccinated during school holidays to avoid having their education disrupted by flu-like side effects of the vaccine.

Covid vaccines may not have been around for many years, but they have been scrutinized from the moment they were developed.

Safety surveillance systems in place around the world – including the UK’s Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency – are collecting and sharing the latest information from hundreds of millions of people who have been vaccinated against Covid to date.

This shows that most side effects are mild and short-lived – such as pain at the injection site or fever. Some more serious side effects, including inflammation of the heart muscle, are rare.

Looking at the history of other vaccines, most side effects appear within the first few months after vaccination. And side effects need to be weighed against the harm of Covid infection.

Some medical conditions put children at higher risk of contracting severe Covid. These include chronic heart disease and, in some cases, congenital heart defects.

If your child’s disease is on the risk list – and it would be best to check with their GP or specialist – then they should be offered two doses of the vaccine to protect them from serious illness.

Otherwise, healthy children are at lower risk of severe Covid, but a small number will still be very unwell.

The natural immunity that results from previous infection helps protect against future infections and diseases.

But how strong this protection is can vary greatly from person to person.

And some studies suggest that protection from serious diseases from vaccines is more consistent.

Getting vaccinated – even if someone has already had Covid-19 – means they are more likely to be protected for longer.

The potential benefits of vaccination are mainly for a future wave of infection; The heavier a future wave, the greater the likely benefits.

In terms of adverse events, fewer than two cases of vaccine-associated myocarditis per million doses have been reported in the United States.

The UK Vaccination Advisory Board has recommended vaccination for your daughter, but there is no great rush for her to get it.

Children are at extremely low risk from the virus, and if she’s recently been infected, she already has built-in protection.

She would have to wait four weeks after her last infection for a vaccination anyway.

Two doses of vaccine on top of that, so she would be well protected if there were a new variant or a new wave of infections this winter.

Vaccines aren’t very good at stopping infection, but they do offer strong protection against serious illnesses, and that lasts for some time.

If you are a parent, do you plan to have your child vaccinated? What are your questions about children receiving a Covid vaccine? Send us your questions and let us know your plans by email: haveyoursay@bbc.co.uk.

Please provide a contact number if you are willing to speak to a BBC journalist. You can also get in touch with us in the following ways:

If you are reading this page and cannot see the form, you must visit the mobile version of the BBC website to submit your question or comment, or you can email us at HaveYourSay@bbc.co.uk. Please include your name, age and place of residence with each submission.