With COVID-19 cases rising in many places, governments yesterday faced the grimmest of dilemmas: push on with a vaccine that is known to save lives or suspend use of AstraZeneca over reports of dangerous blood clots in a few recipients, despite no evidence the shot was responsible.
Sweden was the latest to join a swelling group of EU nations choosing caution over speed, even as European Medicines Agency (EMA) Executive Director Emer Cooke said that there was “no indication” that AstraZeneca vaccines were the cause of the clots.
The EMA is “firmly convinced” that the benefits of the AstraZeneca shot outweigh the risks, but an evaluation is ongoing, Cooke said.
Photo: EPA-EFE
Europe has the luxury to be able to pick from several vaccine candidates, but the decision is still not an easy one on the continent, where the virus is again surging and where the vaccination campaign has repeatedly stumbled.
The choice could be even more fraught elsewhere because many nations are relying heavily on AstraZeneca, which is cheaper and easier to handle than some other brands. The vaccine has so far played a huge role in the global initiative to ensure vaccines get to poorer countries known as COVAX.
The difficulty of the decision was clear in Thailand, the first country outside Europe to temporarily suspend use of the AstraZeneca vaccine, only to recant yesterday — when Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha received a dose.
“There are people who have concerns,” Prayuth said after getting the shot. “But we must believe doctors, believe in our medical professionals.”
Many other countries in Asia have likewise shrugged off concerns, although Indonesia halted use of the vaccine this week, saying it would wait for a WHO report on the issue.
In addition to the EMA, AstraZeneca and the WHO have said there is no evidence the vaccine carries an increased risk of blood clots.
In the meantime, the number of countries in the bloc that are sticking with the shot is falling after heavyweights like Germany, Italy, France and Spain all said they were suspending it.
That left Belgium — and a handful of others such as Poland, Romania and Greece — increasingly isolated in their insistence that halting the shots now would cause a lot more harm that the side effects so hotly debated now.
Experts have said that such concerns are inevitable in mass vaccination campaigns — with so many people getting shots, some are bound to get sick even if the vaccine is not to blame.
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