Denmark, Norway and Iceland suspend AstraZeneca COVID shots after blood clot reports

[irishman25]

4 minutes ago, KhaoYai said:

Apparently there will be an announcement from the EMA tomorrow as to the safety or otherwise of the AZ vaccine.

Based on what happened in Germany when they firstly halted using AZ for over 65's and then re-approved it, I think its fairly certain that public confidence in the AZ vaccine will have been damaged whatever the EMA decides.

If it is subsequently found that the suspensions have been well founded, a few lives may have been saved. If they were unfounded, many lives will be lost.

I feel lucky to live in a country where we are just getting on with things - vaccinating our population against a killer virus.

how many more have to DIE in Europe because there is nothing Wrong with AZ vaccine and one day soon it will be proven i would have no issue taken this vaccine and I am over 70 with heart issue give more years to enjoy life.

[Hi from France]

1 hour ago, polpott said:

What about the word of the vast majority of experts who have concluded that the AZ vaccine does not cause blood clots?

The vast majority of experts?

 

 

Germany, France, Italy Suspend Use of AstraZeneca’s Covid-19 Vaccine

Quote

Germany, France and Italy joined a group of smaller European countries that have temporarily stopped administering Covid-19 vaccines made by AstraZeneca PLC, saying the move was precautionary amid a small number of cases of blood clotting reported on the continent.

Denmark last week said it had paused AstraZeneca shots for two weeks following reports of blood clotting, and several other European countries quickly followed suit, saying they were doing so out of an abundance of caution. Norway, Ireland and the Netherlands are among countries that have paused vaccinating with AstraZeneca’s shot.

Health regulators in the U.K. and Europe, along with AstraZeneca and its vaccine development partners at the University of Oxford, say there is no known connection between severe clotting and the shot

https://www.wsj.com/articles/germany-becomes-latest-european-country-to-suspend-use-of-astrazenecas-covid-19-vaccine-11615820414

 

now, if you ask me personally I'd probably do it anyway, although I would not take the responsibility of vaccinating someone else right now

 

 

 

 

Edited March 15, 2021 by Hi from France

[KhaoYai]

Watching the BBC news this evening a point was raised that I hope is thoroughly investigated.  There are reports of both blood clots and bleeding in people who have had the AZ vaccine. Apparently both those of those ailments are symptoms of Covid 19.  I hope the afflicted people were tested for the disease.

Also on the same news bulletin the damage caused by the halt on administration of the AZ vaccine was discussed.  All parties agreed that damage had already been done through the previous halt in vaccinating the over 65 age group and that this latest problem was certain to cause even more.

One expert pointed out that there was growing mistrust of the AZ amongst the populations of some of the world's poorest countries - those who cannot afford the more expensive vaccines - AZ being one of the cheapest in terms of both cost and distribution.

Bad news not only travels faster than good news, its also much harder to correct. I fear the damage is already done and that will be detrimental to us all.

Quite why so much attention is being paid to a matter that so far has no grounded evidence instead of just how fast vaccines including the AZ product have changed things here in the UK.  I don't gloat in that fact, I think its very sad.

As of 14 March, 24,453,221 people in the UK have had their first vaccination with a further 1,610,280 having completed their second dose.

https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/vaccinations

[Hi from France]

anyway it's easier to suspend the use of something you do not have " In the UK, there are plentiful stocks. In Europe, there are not"

Quote

But the other factor in deciding on suspension could even be supply. In the UK, there are plentiful stocks. In Europe, there are not. AstraZeneca has just cut its proposed deliveries again, down to 30m doses in the first quarter, which is about a third of what was originally promised. Suspending the vaccine is easier in Europe if it is not available in great quantities anyway.

Europe’s caution over Oxford vaccine about more than the science

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/mar/15/europes-caution-over-oxford-vaccine-about-more-than-the-science 

 

 

the new variant in Britanny is apparently "undetectable" (symptoms are there but PCR tests are  negative). Under investigation

Edited March 15, 2021 by Hi from France

[Jeffr2]

9 hours ago, candide said:

In addition, it is worth mentioning that the U.S. has refused to recognise trials made by AZ and has not yet approved the vaccine. The FDA is currently conducting its own trials.

The fact that the vaccine was not approved by the FDA did not prevent AZ from delivering tens of million doses to the US, doses which currently kept in warehouses.

That's not true.  AZ has not applied to the FDA for approval yet as it's clinical trials aren't completed.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/15/health/astra-zeneca-vaccine-blood-clots-bleeding.html

While more than 70 countries have authorized the vaccine, the United States has not. AstraZeneca has not yet applied to the Food and Drug Administration for authorization and is waiting for results from its U.S. trial that enrolled more than 32,000 participants.

 

An announcement from AstraZeneca about those results could come soon: The data from that trial are under review by an independent panel of experts, Dr. Francis Collins, the director of the National Institutes of Health, told Reuters on Monday.

[RobMuir]

Rushed vaccine from the country who arguably have stuffed up covid19 every step of the way. 

I am happy to be vaccinated, but not from anything from Oxford. Not to be trusted.

 

[placeholder]

11 minutes ago, RobMuir said:

Rushed vaccine from the country who arguably have stuffed up covid19 every step of the way. 

I am happy to be vaccinated, but not from anything from Oxford. Not to be trusted.

 

The govt of the UK stuffed up their response. But I got some news for you: AZ is not part of the government.

[Scott]

13 hours ago, Peter Denis said:

Did PM you some information of interest re this matter...

PM's are subject to the same rules as the rest of the forum. 

[Pilotman]

25 minutes ago, RobMuir said:

Rushed vaccine from the country who arguably have stuffed up covid19 every step of the way. 

I am happy to be vaccinated, but not from anything from Oxford. Not to be trusted.

 

An interesting, if misguided view.  So would you trust the Chinses stuff, or even the Russian stuff, over the Oxford stuff?  Odd that, unless you are a brained washed Chinese citizen.  I would trust the UK's MRHA over all other heath care Regulators, including the FDA.  

[mommysboy]

14 hours ago, Hi from France said:

Sorry?

What is your expertise that puts you in a position to contradicts vaccination experts of Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands and Ireland? 

I'm not, but the MRHA (UK), WHO, and EMA say differently.

Anyway what you wrote was plain factually incorrect.

[RobMuir]

27 minutes ago, Pilotman said:

I would trust the UK's MRHA over all other heath care Regulators, including the FDA.  

With 125 000 dead and 4.5 million infected I think your blind faith might be a little misguided.

They haven't just done an average job, they have the worst death rate in the world for countries with a population of over 12 million. 

Despite that your PM talks it up as if he has done a great job! Now other countries are rejecting this rushed vaccine as I will be.

[mommysboy]

Even if the AZ jab is the cause of thrombocytopenia due to a contaminated batch (unlikely), these things are happening in the USA too with the mRNA vaccines. It's the price unfortunately.

I understand that European state health agencies are ultra-conservative about vaccine roll outs, particularly after the swine flu vaccine farce.  In a way that is to be applauded.

However, there is a huge cost to lives in this instance.  The AZ vaccine is dead in the water as far as the EO population is concerned.  It will never be accepted now.  It does mean hundreds and perhaps thousands of lives will be lost (that's not scaremongering) while a new vaccine is sourced.  And will the JJ and SputnikV vaccines be any better.

I think the best thing the EU states can do is suspend vaccination except for Pfizer for a year.  By that time other vaccines will have definitively proved themselves. However, imo the AZ vaccine is done for in the EU, and that's a shame considering its remarkable safety and effectiveness in the UK.  It's a shame and quite unfair really.

Edited March 16, 2021 by mommysboy

[Pilotman]

Just now, RobMuir said:

With 125 000 dead and 4.5 million infected I think your blind faith might be a little misguided.

They haven't just done an average job, they have the worst death rate in the world for countries with a population of over 12 million. 

Despite that your PM talks it up as if he has done a great job! Now other countries are rejecting this rushed vaccine as I will be.

So what is your solution to it all then, ignore it?   I will not be taking  it blindly; fairly reluctantly actually, as I don't like putting anything into my body that I don't know is 100% effective and safe; however it is what it is and  I see no other viable option if this virus is to be brought under control.  

[mommysboy]

2 minutes ago, RobMuir said:

With 125 000 dead and 4.5 million infected I think your blind faith might be a little misguided.

They haven't just done an average job, they have the worst death rate in the world for countries with a population of over 12 million. 

Despite that your PM talks it up as if he has done a great job! Now other countries are rejecting this rushed vaccine as I will be.

The MRHA is the medicine regulatory body of the UK.  

The 'great job' reference is to the UK vaccine roll out, which is proving spectacularly successful using the AZ and Pfizer vaccines, both of which have a similar safety profile in the UK.  These are soon to be augmented by the JJ, Novavax, and Moderna vaccines. And then hopefully Valneva towards the end of the year.

Yes the handling of the pandemic was plain dismal, especially for an island nation which has a natural barrier.

[polpott]

26 minutes ago, RobMuir said:

With 125 000 dead and 4.5 million infected I think your blind faith might be a little misguided.

They haven't just done an average job, they have the worst death rate in the world for countries with a population of over 12 million. 

Despite that your PM talks it up as if he has done a great job! Now other countries are rejecting this rushed vaccine as I will be.

Agree that the UK government have performed very badly in controlling Covid. However AZ is not the UK government. It was the first vaccine to be developed. AZ vaccine fully formulated within 48 hours of Oxford University receiving the genome coding from China back in February. The time taken to deliver the vaccine to the public is due to the 3 stages of trials and extensive independent peer reviewing all of which has been more thorough than any other Covid vaccine. Ask the Australian government who are continuing to vaccinate the population exclusively with the AZ vaccine. There are zero issues with the AZ vaccine.

Unfortunately the Australian government are performing much less well with their vaccination program. Currently only 164k doses issued compared to the UK's 25 million with a substantial increase in daily vaccinations being predicted in the next week or two.

[mommysboy]

1 hour ago, polpott said:

Agree that the UK government have performed very badly in controlling Covid. However AZ is not the UK government. It was the first vaccine to be developed. AZ vaccine fully formulated within 48 hours of Oxford University receiving the genome coding from China back in February. The time taken to deliver the vaccine to the public is due to the 3 stages of trials and extensive independent peer reviewing all of which has been more thorough than any other Covid vaccine. Ask the Australian government who are continuing to vaccinate the population exclusively with the AZ vaccine. There are zero issues with the AZ vaccine.

Unfortunately the Australian government are performing much less well with their vaccination program. Currently only 164k doses issued compared to the UK's 25 million with a substantial increase in daily vaccinations being predicted in the next week or two.

Sure, but there has been less of a medical emergency in Australia due to the superb handling of the crisis.

By the way, does anyone know where the now infamous European batch comes from?  If it is batch contamination from Europe itself that would be a horrible irony.

[polpott]

4 minutes ago, mommysboy said:

Sure, but there has been less of a medical emergency in Australia due to the superb handling of the crisis.

By the way, does anyone know where the now infamous European batch comes from?  If it is batch contamination from Europe itself that would be a horrible irony.

The emergency now in Australia is to open its borders a bit. Sealed tight as a nut, much to the annoyance of many Aussies. The answer is mass vaccination.

There is no "European batch" another baseless slur from the anti British/anti AZ brigade.

Edited March 16, 2021 by polpott

[Bkk Brian]

23 minutes ago, mommysboy said:

Sure, but there has been less of a medical emergency in Australia due to the superb handling of the crisis.

By the way, does anyone know where the now infamous European batch comes from?  If it is batch contamination from Europe itself that would be a horrible irony.

I would hazard a guess that it was either a batch manufactured in Italy or Belgium although its apparently not all from one batch.

"The suspensions in Italy and Austria involve different batches of the vaccine.

Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Luxembourg have also suspended the use of the same batch as Austria. Romania has suspended use of 4,200 doses from the same batch of vaccines as Italy". https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-56357760

 

[mommysboy]

23 minutes ago, polpott said:

The emergency now in Australia is to open its borders a bit. Sealed tight as a nut, much to the annoyance of many Aussies. The answer is mass vaccination.

There is no "European batch" another baseless slur from the anti British/anti AZ brigade.

Well, it can't be safe in the UK and be unsafe in the EU. 

The first logical explanation is that there is  batch contamination.  Most if not all of the AZ vaccines in the UK originated there.  We do know that the EU batch didn't.

Other than that, either the UK or EU have got things wrong, and right now it would be absurd to think it is the UK- given the hard data and spectacular success.

[andyg75]

4 hours ago, RobMuir said:

Rushed vaccine from the country who arguably have stuffed up covid19 every step of the way. 

I am happy to be vaccinated, but not from anything from Oxford. Not to be trusted.

 

Some people just haven’t got a clue what they are talking about.

[candide]

6 hours ago, Jeffr2 said:

That's not true.  AZ has not applied to the FDA for approval yet as it's clinical trials aren't completed.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/15/health/astra-zeneca-vaccine-blood-clots-bleeding.html

While more than 70 countries have authorized the vaccine, the United States has not. AstraZeneca has not yet applied to the Food and Drug Administration for authorization and is waiting for results from its U.S. trial that enrolled more than 32,000 participants.

An announcement from AstraZeneca about those results could come soon: The data from that trial are under review by an independent panel of experts, Dr. Francis Collins, the director of the National Institutes of Health, told Reuters on Monday.

I did not write that AZ applied and that its application has been refused. There is no mention of that in my post.

I wrote that the FDA does not recognise prior trials made by AZ. The only thing not true (I would say not precisely expressed) is that the FDA is conducting the test. Actually It's AstraZeneca, according to FDA requirements. AZ has not applied yet, because it cannot apply on the basis of prior trials, as they are not recognised by the FDA.

Claims have been made been made in this thread that: (1) EU and EU member States have been unnecessarily cautious and procedural about the results of AZ trials and (2) that a late approval was the ground for AZ cutting deliveries, despite a €336 million pre-payment.

My point is that: (1) the US is even more demanding than the EU (or procedural, whatever one calls it) which leads to a much later approval date than in the EU and (2) the fact that there was no approval has not prevented AZ from delivering tens of million of doses.

https://www.modernhealthcare.com/safety-quality/why-astrazeneca-and-jjs-vaccines-use-elsewhere-are-still-hold-america

Edited March 16, 2021 by candide

[placeholder]

5 hours ago, Pilotman said:

  I would trust the UK's MRHA over all other heath care Regulators, including the FDA.  

Why?

[Pilotman]

2 minutes ago, placeholder said:

Why?

Because I believe them to be more cautious, more scientifically capable and more thorough in following best practice before releasing drugs to the public and  not so in league with the drug companies. They are still culturally scarred as an organisation from the Thalidomide disaster all those years ago.  

[Hi from France]

5 hours ago, mommysboy said:

Even if the AZ jab is the cause of thrombocytopenia due to a contaminated batch (unlikely), these things are happening in the USA too with the mRNA vaccines. It's the price unfortunately.

I think the best thing the EU states can do is suspend vaccination except for Pfizer for a year.  By that time other vaccines will have definitively proved themselves. However, imo the AZ vaccine is done for in the EU, and that's a shame considering its remarkable safety and effectiveness in the UK.  It's a shame and quite unfair really.

I think you are too negative. 

 

The damage done in terms of Oxford's reputation and additional deaths is there, but on the "plus" side,

* vaccination with Oxford / AZ will restart and hobble along (we'd use "cahin-caha" in French). 

* "it's easier to suspend the use of something you do not have " the 30M doses left for all of Europe will be used anyway. Even if the 100M doses promised were delivered, they would have been used. 

 

We have to trust the other technologies, mostly mRNA vaccines, and J&J's and other (nasal spray, Russian, Chinese... ), will be produced faster instead of the AZ, because lots of people will refuse it.

Now as I said, inferior as it is, many would still take it, including myself. 

 

I did not find a vaccine delivery / use diagram image for the past and next months. If you have one... mRNA vaccines can be produced fast and in quantity. 

Edited March 16, 2021 by Hi from France

[Hi from France]

On another forum in France, we have a specialist wondering why AZ used.. 

 

Quote

.. Chimpanzee adenovirus while all other labs that have developed the same type of vaccine technology have used either adeno 26 or adeno 5 

 

Expect a lot of debate there, but I'm not sure us mere mortals would be able to understand these debates 

[Hi from France]

apparently, there is a specific blend of blood clot associated with AZ = Cerebral venous sinus thrombosis (CVST) it is linked to the AZ vaccine.

 

now the risk is 7.6 times smaller than a birth control pill

 

source : https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4313700/

[KhaoYai]

6 hours ago, RobMuir said:

Rushed vaccine from the country who arguably have stuffed up covid19 every step of the way. 

I am happy to be vaccinated, but not from anything from Oxford. Not to be trusted.

 

Total nonsense.  The 'rushed vaccine' argument never held any water - before making such comments you would do well to research just how most of the vaccine manufacturers managed to make an effective product in record time.  Rushed testing maybe - clearly its impossible for there to have been any long term testing but the entire world is in an emergency situation, over 2.6 million people have died.

As others have said others have said, the UK made a mess of its response to the virus in the early stages and has made mistakes since then. Track and Trace has been a very expensive disaster etc. etc. I haven't seen anybody praising Boris Johnson's policies regarding the virus - we are fully aware of what they have cost us and hopefully at some point, the UK government will be held to account over its handling of the crisis.

However, the Oxford/Astra Zeneca vaccine has been one of the success stories of the pandemic and apart from some funding, is nothing whatsoever to do with the British government.

The UK is far from alone in its mishandling of the pandemic - other countries continue to do so and this unfounded suspension of the AZ vaccine may turn out to be the biggest mistake some of them have made.

Even if the EMA declares the vaccine to be safe today, the damage is done and that, I have absolutely no doubt, that will cost lives.  Look at Italy for example - they are experiencing a third wave and about to go into lockdown again, yet they deny their citizens a vaccine that has already been given to over 11 million British citizens without any problems.

[KhaoYai]

AZ Vaccination + 9 days and still no blood clots - along with 11 million + other UK citizens.

[7by7]

22 hours ago, KhaoYai said:

On 3/15/2021 at 10:35 AM, 7by7 said:

Then why are you still blaming the EU?

I think that's obvious. 

Yes, it's very obvious.

23 hours ago, KhaoYai said:

Official  medical sources, notably the EMA say there is no reason to stop administration of the AZ vaccine

The EMA is an advisory organisation. As the UK proved when we approved the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine whist still subject to all EU rules and regulations, EU members do not have to follow it's advice.

Both the EMA and the WHO are still recommending the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine. However, in light of the report from Norway's Medicines Agency I linked to previously and subsequent ones from elsewhere, both organisations are investigating these reports. EMA, WHO investigate reported clots with AstraZeneca vaccine

23 hours ago, KhaoYai said:

politicians from EU countries, EU politicians, whatever semantics you wish to use, 

Semantics have nothing to do with it. If a country, e.g. Norway and Iceland, are not members of the EU then their politicians are not EU politicians!

23 hours ago, KhaoYai said:

are the ones taking the decisions to halt the AZ vaccine. If that's not politicians going against medical advice, I'll eat my hat.

As previously shown, but yet again ignored by you, politicians from various countries, some EU members, others not, are acting on the medical advice of their own health or other appropriate departments; such as Norway's Medicines Agency.

Nothing in the rest of your post changes any of that!

[mommysboy]

Here's what Astrazeneca say:

https://www.astrazeneca.com/media-centre/press-releases/2021/update-on-the-safety-of-covid-19-vaccine-astrazeneca.html

 

What is clear is that this stuff is not boiled up in a kitchen and then tested by Uncle Alf!

Zero chance of a batch defect.

My best guess is this is an issue of sensitivity: the European states are known to be ultra conservative.

The real issue is about a condition called thrombocytopenia, which is linked (perhaps) to all three of the main vaccines.