Hello, I'm Nulam McGovran on the BBC World Service and this is BBC OS,

Conversations on Coronavirus, Protecting Vulnerable Children. children.

We bring together parents who continue to care for children with compromised immune systems during the pandemic. And those in Russia who are grieving for loved ones

lost to COVID after being unable to persuade them to get a vaccine.

It's kind of hard to forgive yourself for that because when everyone's vaccinated and the most vulnerable

part of the family is not in the end you feel responsible.

When the pandemic began, many countries realized that certain groups were more vulnerable and needed to be protected or shielded, such as the elderly and those who may have a pre-existing health condition.

Well, more than 6 billion vaccines have been administered around the world, affording

some more freedom in their lives, but the risks of a

potentially fatal dose of COVID-19 remains for others, such as children with the suppressed

immune system.

I spoke to three parents of immunocompromised children

about how they continue to protect them

as restrictions relax and attitudes differ. They are Anita in the UK and two mothers in the United States, Heather and first, Kristen.

My daughter Riley is 14 now, but when she was 3 and a half she had Stevens Johnson

syndrome it's not something that's necessarily widely known about but it is an

allergic or severe reaction to a medication or a virus and in her case it was ibuprofen.

She lost most of her skin. She ended up blind in one eye and has severe light sensitivity.

She's gone under anesthesia 200 times in the last 10 years.

And it is an immune condition.

So her immunologist has told us that she's not

to get the vaccine yet, which is unfortunate because I was hoping that that was going to be a layer of protection that we had for her, but she can't.

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