The Working Group on Vaccines in Ireland recommends temporary cessation of blood clots among those receiving COVID.
The Working Group on Vaccines in Ireland has recommended the temporary suspension of the launch of the AstraZeneca coronavirus jab, following reports of blood clots in adults who have been shot.
“The National Immunization Advisory Committee (NIAC) has recommended that COVID-19 AstraZeneca be temporarily postponed this morning,” Ireland’s Deputy Medical Director Ronan Glynn said on Sunday.
He said the recommendation was made “on a precautionary basis” after “a report by the Norwegian Medicines Agency with four new reports of serious blood clotting events in adults after vaccination”.
The NIAC is due to meet on Sunday morning and issue an additional statement on the matter.
Jonah Hull of Al Jazeera, reported from London, said the Irish working group’s move was worrying for the drug maker.
“The company was quick to jump on this bandwagon and strongly defended its vaccine, stressing that safety data compiled over the past two months did not show any increased risk of pulmonary embolism or thrombosis,” Hull said.
The recommendation comes at a time when the Irish authorities are pressuring the pharmaceutical company to speed up supply with the country.
To date, approximately 570,000 doses of coronavirus vaccines have been administered in Ireland, according to government data last Wednesday.
A total of 109,000 of these doses were manufactured by the Anglo-Swedish pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca, which developed its vaccine with Oxford University.
Meanwhile, Norway announced on Thursday that it is also stopping the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine.
“This is a warning decision,” Geir Bukholm, director of infection prevention and control at the Norwegian Institute of Public Health (FHI), told a news conference.
FHI did not say how long the suspension will last.
“We are waiting for information to see if there is a link between vaccination and this case with a blood clot,” Bukholm said.
Also on Thursday, Italy said it would suspend the use of a different AstraZeneca lot than the one used in Austria.
Austria has stopped using a batch of AstraZeneca photos while investigating a death caused by clotting disorders and an illness caused by a pulmonary embolism.
Denmark will not use the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine for two weeks, after reporting that some beneficiaries developed severe blood clots and in one case could have died as a result, the country’s authorities said on Thursday. They did not say how many reports of blood clots.
Meanwhile, AstraZeneca told Reuters in a written statement that the safety of its vaccine has been studied extensively in human studies, and data from colleagues confirmed that the vaccine was generally well tolerated.