COVID-19 Vaccine information for Parents/Carers of Children and Adolescents aged over 12yrs with Epilepsy, attending at Children’s Health Ireland (CHI)

The National Immunisation Advisory Committee(NIAC) have recommended that all those aged 12 to 15yrs should be included in the Covid-19 vaccination program and that they should be offered an mRNA vaccine. The names of the two available mRNA vaccines are Pfizer/BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine(Comirnaty®) and COVID-19 Vaccine Moderna (Spikevax®). For patients with Epilepsy one vaccine is not recommended over another.

 A history of seizures and epilepsy is not a contraindication to receiving the COVID-19 Vaccine and our recommendation is that all eligible children should receive the vaccine. The efficacy of the vaccine may be affected by steroid or IVIG therapy which are sometimes used in Epilepsy management.

Click here for further information on the COVID-19 vaccine via the HSE COVID-19 website.