EU agency finds AstraZeneca vaccine can cause rare blood clots
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Source: CNN
EU agency finds AstraZeneca vaccine can cause rare blood clots, as UK advises other shots for under-30s
(CNN) European drug regulators have confirmed a link between the Oxford-AstraZeneca Covid-19 shot and rare blood clots, as UK authorities recommended that people under 30 should take alternative vaccines.
The European Medicines Agency (EMA) said Wednesday that a particular combination of unusual blood clots with low blood platelet counts should be listed as a side effect of the vaccine, but stopped short of recommending its use be limited. The benefits of the shot outweigh the risks and Covid-19 is a "very serious disease," it added.
UK regulators took a more cautious approach, saying healthy adults under 30 should be offered other vaccines. Officials described the move as a "course correction" that would not derail the country's rapid inoculation program.
The findings could have enormous implications for developing and middle-income countries, many of which are accessing the AstraZeneca shot through Covax, a vaccine-sharing scheme.
Read more: https://edition.cnn.com/2021/04/07/health/astrazeneca-coronavirus-vaccine-europe-uk-ema-intl/index.html
UK advises limiting AstraZeneca in under-30s amid clot worry
LONDON (AP) — British authorities recommended Wednesday that the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine not be given to adults under 30 where possible because of strengthening evidence that the shot may be linked to rare blood clots.
The recommendation came as regulators both in the United Kingdom and the European Union emphasized that the benefits of receiving the vaccine continue to outweigh the risks for most people — even though the European Medicines Agency said it had found a “possible link” between the shot and the rare clots. British authorities recommended that people under 30 be offered alternatives to AstraZeneca. But the EMA advised no such age restrictions, leaving it up to its member-countries to decide whether to limit its use.
Several countries have already imposed limits on who can receive the vaccine, and any restrictions are closely watched since the vaccine, which is cheaper and easier to store than many others, is critical to global immunization campaigns and is a pillar of the U.N.-backed program known as COVAX that aims to get vaccines to some of the world’s poorest countries.
“This is a course correction, there’s no question about that,” Jonathan Van-Tam, England’s deputy chief medical officer, said during a press briefing. “But it is, in a sense, in medicine quite normal for physicians to alter their preferences for how patients are treated over time.”
https://apnews.com/article/eu-rare-blood-clots-possibly-linked-astrazeneca-vaccine-1ec87a9b7f14f98e29962e9d055d27ed
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