PH won’t halt rollout of AstraZeneca vaccines

BY ANALOU C. DE VERA

The country will continue the use of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) vaccine developed by British firm AstraZeneca in its vaccination program despite some countries temporarily halted its use to investigate reports of blood clot.

Both the Department of Health (DoH) and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said they are aware of the situation in some countries in Europe that temporarily pause their “vaccination campaign with COVID-19 vaccine AstraZeneca following reports of blood clots in people who received the vaccine.”

“This has been decided as a precautionary measure, while they conduct a full investigation to determine causality between the vaccination and the reported adverse events following immunization,” the DoH and FDA said in a joint statement on Friday, March 12.

“The DoH and FDA emphasize that there is no indication for the Philippines to stop (the) rollout of AstraZeneca vaccines,” it added.

Some of the European nations that have temporarily suspended the use of AstraZeneca’s vaccine include Austria, Estonia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Latvia, Denmark, Iceland, and Norway.

Citing the European Medicine Authority, the DoH and FDA said there is “currently no indication that vaccination has caused these conditions, which are not listed as side effects with this vaccine.”

The Philippines has so far received 525,600 doses of AstraZeneca vaccines through the World Health Organization (WHO)-led COVAX facility.