Through its helpline, Da Nang Newspaper readers asked: What side effects do children have after being vaccinated against COVID-19 and how should parents take care of them?

According to the Da Nang Centre for Disease Control (CDC), children vaccinated against COVID-19 may experience mild side effects (maybe after one or two days) such as pain at the injection site, swelling, colour change (red, purple at injection site), fatigue, headache, muscle pain, joint pain, chills and low fever. Parents and children should not be too worried about these common reactions.

To handle the above-mentioned reactions, parents should advise children to limit movement of the injection site to reduce symptoms. Antipyretics can be used to reduce fever/pain. These reactions usually appear within 30 minutes or 24 hours after injection, in some cases, they can persist for 72 hours.

Therefore, parents need to closely monitor their children in the first three days after injection in order to prevent possible dangerous reactions in the child.

In addition, after receiving COVID-19 vaccines, children may have some (uncommon) symptoms such as hives, swollen lymph nodes in the neck, throat/mouth, difficulty breathing, lethargy, drowsiness, drowsiness and high fever over 40 degrees Celsius, convulsions or numbness of hands and feet.

Children may also display (rare) symptoms such as chest tightness, shortness of breath and palpitations. When children have these reactions, parents should immediately notify the injection unit or take them to the nearest medical facility for timely handling.

To ensure the health of children, parents are highly recommended to give their children a full meal of protein foods groups and encourage them to take a rest, drink lots of water, eat fruit and avoid strenuous physical activities after being vaccinated against the highly contagious disease.

Reporting by THANH TINH – Translating by A. THU