Covid-19 vaccine: allergy warning about new vaccine

People with a history of major allergic reactions shouldn’t get the new Covid puncture, regulators say.

It came after two NHS workers had allergic reactions on Tuesday.

The Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) said the advice applies to anyone who has had significant reactions to drugs, foods or vaccines.

Both people had a reaction shortly after receiving the Pfizer / BioNTech jab, received treatment, and are now fine.

They are believed to have had an anaphylactoid reaction, much milder than anaphylaxis, which tends to involve a skin rash, shortness of breath, and sometimes a drop in blood pressure.

Both NHS workers have a history of severe allergies and carry adrenaline pens with them.

Professor Stephen Powis, England’s NHS medical director, said both individuals are making a good recovery.

“As is common with new vaccines, the MHRA has advised as a precaution that people with a significant history of allergic reactions should not receive this vaccine after two people with a history of significant allergic reactions responded adversely,” he said.

MHRA Director Dr. June Raine said it was right to take this step now that “we have had this experience.”

Reactions like this are rare, but they occur with other vaccines, including the annual flu shot.

Similar reactions were not seen in clinical trials of this drug in which more than 20,000 people were vaccinated, although people with a history of allergic reactions would not have been recruited.

Several thousand people were vaccinated Tuesday at hospital clinics on the first day of the UK launch of the new Covid jab.

Meanwhile, the NHS has announced that the vaccination program will go towards general practitioner surgeries starting next week.

The doses are expected to be delivered to around 200 GP surgeries initially to allow them to begin on Tuesday. Those over 80 will be invited first.

Once the first 200 GPs have received their doses, the program will expand to more than 1,000 surgeries, and each local area will have a designated site.

It means that most patients will be invited to a medical facility other than the usual one.

Similar arrangements are underway in the rest of the UK.

Dr Richard Vautrey, head of GPs for the British Medical Association, said GPs were “ready to go.”

“We have a lot of experience in delivering vaccines, and we’ll be able to do it to millions of people a week. It really depends on the supply and how quickly we can get our hands on it.”

The vaccine still cannot be brought into nursing homes or homebound patients due to strict rules on its storage and distribution. It must be kept in ultra-cold storage until a few days before use, so only patients who can attend surgeries can be vaccinated initially.

The NHS hopes to get clarification on how it can move the vaccine around soon.

The vaccine will be delivered to GPs from the network of hospitals that store the jab in special freezers.

They will then have three and a half days to use their doses, with each center receiving an initial delivery of 975 doses.

Thousands of patients were vaccinated Tuesday at hospital clinics, including those over 80 and staff at the NHS and nursing home.

All 70 hospitals in the UK have received 800,000 doses, but another delivery of more than a million is expected to be shipped from Belgium next week to allow the community program to get under way.

By the end of the year, the government expects to have received around 5 million doses in total, enough for 2.5 million people, as two doses of the vaccine are needed for full protection.

Health Secretary Matt Hancock said the vaccine program marks the “beginning of the fight against our common enemy, the coronavirus.”

He stressed that people did not need to apply for the vaccine, adding that the NHS would contact those eligible and urged them to “step forward for their country.” The vaccine is not mandatory.

Hancock went on to warn that “there was still a long march ahead”, saying there were “worrying signs” of the virus growing in Essex, London and Kent.

The UK is the first country in the world to start using the Pfizer jab.

The first recipient was Margaret Keenan, who will turn 91 next week. He was hit on Tuesday at Coventry University Hospital and described as “the best early birthday present.”