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The age of administration in the immunization schedule refers to the minimum age for giving a vaccine dose. Vaccines should be administered at the recommended age or as soon as possible after the recommended age. Specific timings and ages for administering certain vaccine doses are shown below and detailed in the second section, "Instructions for Use of Vaccines."1. The first dose of hepatitis B (HepB) vaccine is to be given within 24 hours of birth.2. Bacille Calmette-Guérin (BCG) vaccine is given <3 months of age.3. The third dose of HepB vaccine, the third dose of poliovirus vaccine, the third dose of Diphtheria, tetanus, and pertussis (DTaP), the first dose of Measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR), and the first dose of Japanese encephalitis vaccine, live (JE-L) or the second dose of Japanese encephalitis vaccine, inactivated (JE-I) are all to be administered before 12 months of age (during infancy, before the first birthday).4. The second dose of Group A meningococcal polysaccharide vaccine (MPSV-A) is given <18 months.5. The second MMR dose, the first hepatitis A vaccine, live (HepA-L) or hepatitis A vaccine, inactivated (HepA-I) dose, and the fourth DTaP are all to be given <24 months of age (during the second year of life).6. The second dose of HepA-I, and the second dose of JE-L or the third dose of JE-I are to be given <3 years of age (before the third birthday).7. The first dose of Group A and Group C meningococcal polysaccharide vaccine (MPSV-AC) is to be given <4 years of age.8. The fourth dose of poliovirus vaccine is to be given <5 years of age. 9. Diphtheria-Tetanus vaccine (DT), the second dose of MPSV-AC, and the fourth dose of JE-I are to be given <7 years of age.Children who are not vaccinated on time according to the routine schedule shown above should be vaccinated in accordance with the catch-up vaccination principles, described below and given in detail in the second section, "Instructions for Use of Vaccines."

COVID-19 Vaccines Technical Working GroupVaccines against the COVID-19 virus are being developed in China and other countries at an accelerated pace to prevent and control COVID-19. Strategies and policy for the use of the vaccines are based on scientific evidence including epidemiology, vaccinology, health economics, ethics, and production factors. The National Immunization Advisory Committee (NIAC) makes evidence-based recommendations for the use of vaccines and is supported by working groups of technical experts. We report the establishment of a technical working group for COVID-19 vaccines, its terms of references, anticipated products, and membership.The NIAC was established in 2017 by China's National Health Commission (NHC) at the request of the State Council to make evidence-based recommendations to the NHC on the inclusion of vaccines in the Expanded Program on Immunization (EPI) and recommendations for use of vaccines (1). NIAC was included in the vaccine law enacted by the People's Congress in 2019. Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (China CDC) scientists, with NIAC members and external experts, lead and staff technical working groups (TWGs) to support the NIAC vaccine recommendations using an evidence-torecommendation framework to formulate draft vaccine recommendations for consideration by the NIAC (2). We report the establishment of a NIAC TWG for COVID-19 vaccines, describe its terms of reference and anticipated products, and provide contact information for the TWG.

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