Following the recommendation of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the Department of Health (DOH) stated that it has temporarily stopped administration of the COVID-19 vaccine produced by the British-Swedish company, AstraZeneca to people under 60 years of age.
Such direction from FDA came when a link between the coronavirus shot and a few cases of unusual blood clots with minimum platelet count was discovered by European drug regulators.
FDA Director General Rolando Domingo had asked DOH for the inventory of the said vaccine and recommended not using it on people below 60 years until a clearer guidance and evidence has been obtained from the World Health Organization (WHO) and the country’s experts.
For its part, the European Medicines Agency reported that it has finished reviewing 62 cases of clotting in the sinuses that drain blood from the brain and 24 cases of clotting in the abdomen, with 18 of this fatal.
To avoid panic, Domingo made it clear that the people who had this reaction were under 60 and they had received no report of similar adverse effects for those who were already given the vaccine.
Currently, both FDA and DOH are meticulously reviewing details related to this latest development so as to come up with proper recommendations on usage of the vaccine.
Domingo also pointed out that the side effects were observed only after the first dose. Hence, if nothing out of the ordinary was felt during the first dose, there should be no problem with the second dose.