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The On Wednesday, the so-called Standing Committee on Immunization (STIKO) will introduce a new rule. – a panel of experts to assist the federal government in its work on communicable disease control, recommend.
The committee issued a new recommendation because
According to the latest scientific knowledge, the vaccine can cause blood clots in the brain in people under 60 years of age. This side effect is very rare but very serious.
Angela Merkel said.
The change caused uncertainty, but there was no other option. Data on possible side effects cannot be hidden, “swept under the rug”, and the greatest possible confidence in the vaccine can only be created through “openness and transparency,” emphasized the German chancellor.
Health Minister Jens Spahn added: the change could help vaccinate those over 60 more quickly, which is especially important in light of the third wave of epidemics that is increasing. In the second quarter from April, 15 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine could arrive in Germany, according to the manufacturer’s commitment, and there will be many people over 60 who will be “happy” to inject the vaccine themselves, said the Minister. He stressed that the vaccine, developed in collaboration with the University of Oxford and the British-Swedish pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca, is extremely effective in the elderly, even more effective than the Pfizer / BioNTech vaccine, according to some indicators.
As a general rule, the STIKO recommendation advises restricting the use of the vaccine to those over 60 years of age. The possible The AstraZeneca vaccine can be given to people under the age of 60 based on an individual decision based on detailed information about side effects. Jens Spahn added.
He explained that the panel will make another recommendation at the end of April on what vaccinations should be given to the two million people who have already been vaccinated with the first dose of AstraZeneca.
The minister said: in Germany so far In 31 cases, a temporal association was demonstrated between the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine and cerebral thrombosis. Vascular damage was fatal in nine cases. Of the 31 affected, 29 are women between the ages of 20 and 63. Similar cases have occurred abroad, and Germany is not the only country where the use of the vaccine is restricted, added Jens Spahn, citing Canada as an example.
Both the Prime Minister and his Minister stressed that the change in the regulations governing the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine does not require a change in the goal of making vaccination available to all except children by the end of the summer, 22 of September.
Top image: Newly arrived AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccines upon receipt in Kaposvár, Somogy County Government Office Public Health Department warehouse, on March 30, 2021. Source: MTI / György Varga
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