The CDC and the FDA have recommended an immediate hiatus in the use of Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine because of rare side effects, including blood clotting.
More than 6.8 million people received the J&J vaccine in the United States, and as a result, only six people suffered from a rare clotting disease.
Here’s what the FDA and CDC say you should do:
Vaccine for J&J consumers
People who have received the J&J vaccine and develop severe headaches, abdominal pain, leg pain, or difficulty breathing within three weeks of vaccination should contact their healthcare provider.
J&J vaccine for doctors
Healthcare providers are asked to report adverse events to the vaccine adverse event reporting system at https://vaers.hhs.gov/reportevent.html
The FDA and CDC provide this additional warning:
“The treatment of this specific type of blood clot is different from the treatment that would normally be given. Usually, an anticoagulant drug called heparin is used to treat blood clots. In this context, administration of heparin can be dangerous. to be applied. “
What causes this coagulation?
It is not yet known why these strange blood clots occur in some patients receiving the J&J vaccine. The six people who experienced clots were women between the ages of 18 and 48, the FDA and the CDC said. They had what is called cerebral venous sinus thrombosis or CVST, as well as low levels of platelets in the blood.
So far, concerns about unusual blood clots have focused on the AstraZeneca vaccine, which has not yet received authorization in the US Last week, European regulators said they found a possible link between injections and a very rare type. time. with low blood platelets, one that seems to occur more in younger people.
J&J and AstraZeneca vaccines are manufactured using the same technology. Unlike Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, which train the body to recognize the protein tip that covers the outer surface of the coronavirus, J&J and AstraZeneca vaccines use a cold virus called adenovirus to carry the tip gene into the body. J&J uses a human adenovirus to create its vaccine, while AstraZeneca uses a chimpanzee version.