As an article in the journal Current Biology explained earlier this week, the COVID-19 pandemic is repeatedly demonstrating the vital need for animal studies. Today, Wired Magazine provided additional proof in a story titled “Making a COVID-19 Vaccine Is Hard. Making One for Kids Is Harder.“ Writer Gregory Barber explains how monkeys at the California National Primate Research Center are providing critical information to help us understand how COVID-19 vaccines will impact children. 

Here’s an excerpt: 

For those feeling lost in this time-bending pandemic summer, consider this frame of reference: the birthing season of the rhesus macaque. At the California National Primate Research Center, the first infants of the year arrived in February, just as the virus took hold in the surrounding area. The births continued through the spring, during which the virus surged and adult monkeys became a key model to plumb how humans might respond to the virus and vaccines. The last infants of the season showed up a few weeks ago. Among those stragglers, 16 were selected for an experiment: an inoculation with one of two Covid-19 vaccine candidates currently in late-stage clinical trials. It’s a first step toward answering a question that’s received little attention in that warp-speed, all-hands-on-deck effort: how children will respond to a Covid-19 vaccine.   

The full article can be found at this link.