• Covid-19: EU states to resume AstraZeneca vaccine rollout

    From karmabum@1:229/2 to All on Friday, March 19, 2021 10:44:35
    From: karmabum@anashram.com

    The EU's leading states are to restart their roll-out of the
    Oxford-AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine after Europe's medicines regulator concluded it was "safe and effective".

    The European Medicines Agency (EMA) reviewed the jab after 13 European countries suspended use of the vaccine over fears of a link to blood clots.

    It found the jab was "not associated" with a higher risk of clots.

    Germany, France, Italy and Spain said they would resume using the jab.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-56440139

    It is up to individual EU states to decide whether and when to re-start vaccinations using the AstraZeneca vaccine. Sweden said it needed a "few
    days" to decide.

    The World Health Organization (WHO) on Thursday called on countries to
    continue using the vaccine, and is due to release the results of its own
    review into the vaccine's safety on Friday.

    The agency's investigation focused on a small number of cases of unusual
    blood disorders. In particular, it was looking at cases of cerebral venous thrombosis - blood clots in the head.

    Decisions to suspend use of the vaccine sparked concerns over the pace of
    the region's vaccination drive, which had already been affected by supply shortages.

    French Prime Minister Jean Castex announced new measures for his country
    on Thursday, saying the pandemic was clearly accelerating and a "third
    wave" of infections looked increasingly likely.

    What did the EMA say exactly?

    Emer Cooke, the agency's executive director, told a news conference: "This
    is a safe and effective vaccine."

    "Its benefits in protecting people from Covid-19 with the associated risks
    of death and hospitalisation outweigh the possible risks."

    The EMA's expert committee on medicine safety, Mrs Cooke said, had found
    that "the vaccine is not associated with an increase in the overall risk
    of... blood clots".

    But the EMA, she added, could not rule out definitively a link between the vaccine and a "small number of cases of rare and unusual but very serious clotting disorders".

    Therefore the committee has, she said, recommended raising awareness of
    these possible risks, making sure they are included in the product
    information. Additional investigations are being launched, Mrs Cooke added.

    "If it was me, I would be vaccinated tomorrow," Mrs Cooke added. "But I
    would want to know that if anything happened to me after vaccination what
    I should do about it and that's what we're saying today."

    Welcoming the review's endorsement of the vaccine as safe and effective,
    German Health Minister Jens Spahn added, "Doctors should be informed about
    the risk of venous thrombosis in women under 55 years of age, so that they
    in turn can inform patients."

    Thirteen European countries suspended use of the vaccine, after reports of
    a small number of cases of blood clots among vaccine recipients in the
    region.

    Leading EU states said they had opted to pause their use of the drug as a "precautionary measure".

    "There were a few very unusual and troubling cases which justify this
    pause and the analysis," French immunologist Alain Fischer, who heads a government advisory board, told France Inter radio. "It's not lost time."

    In Germany, the health ministry also pointed to a small number of rare
    blood clots in vaccinated people when justifying its decision. It
    postponed a summit on extending the vaccine rollout ahead of the EMA's announcement.

    Other countries, such as Austria, halted the use of certain batches of the drug, while Belgium, Poland and the Czech Republic were among those to say
    they would continue to administer the AstraZeneca vaccine.

    Decisions to halt rollouts of the AstraZeneca vaccine were criticised by
    some politicians and scientists.

    A spokeswoman for Germany's opposition Free Democrats said the decision
    had set back the country's entire vaccination rollout. German Greens
    health expert Janosch Dahmen, meanwhile, argued that authorities could
    have continued using the drug.

    Dr Anthony Cox, who researches drug safety at the UK's University of Birmingham, told the BBC it was a "cascade of bad decision-making that's
    spread across Europe".

    The company says there is no evidence of an increased risk of clotting due
    to the vaccine.

    It said it had received 37 reports of blood clots out of more than 17
    million people vaccinated in the EU and UK as of 8 March.

    These figures were "much lower than would be expected to occur naturally
    in a general population of this size and is similar across other licensed Covid-19 vaccines", it said.

    Professor Andrew Pollard, director of the Oxford vaccine group which
    developed the Oxford-AstraZeneca jab, told the BBC on Monday that there
    was "very reassuring evidence that there is no increase in a blood clot phenomenon here in the UK, where most of the doses in Europe [have] been
    given so far".

    British Health Secretary Matt Hancock this week urged people to "listen to
    the regulators" and to "get the jab".

    ### - whew! :D

    so after a stewards inquiry they've decided 'not' to disqualify the astra-Z-horse?

    was defo a good bet then huh :)))

    had my shot anyway 3-weeks ago today and don't feel any different
    whatsoever, at least nada i can detect, that rabbi in israel (not iran as
    you reported) telling people it turns ya gay is obviously just another mad nutjob runnin' around talkin' shit Chris, pay no attention + am surprised
    ya even took that on board?? (ooh ducky!)

    (crackin' up laffing haha)

    so place yer bets before this virus rips ya a new one folks!

    and don't be a 'wuss' about it!

    (fyi: that's part wimp and part puss ahaha) :D

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: www.darkrealms.ca (1:229/2)