UK regulator says total of 30 cases of blood clot events linked to AstraZeneca vaccine

UK regulators said they have identified 30 cases of rare blood clot events after the use of Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine.

However, the health officials said they still believe the benefits of the vaccine in the prevention of Covid-19 far outweigh any possible risk of blood clots.

The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency said it had received no blood clot events following use of Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine.

Some countries have restricted use of the AstraZeneca vaccine while others have resumed inoculations, as investigations into reports of rare, and sometimes severe, blood clots continue.

On March 18, the UK medicines regulator said that there had been five cases of a rare brain blood clot among 11 million administered shots.

On Thursday, it put the count at 22 reports of cerebral venous sinus thrombosis, an extremely rare brain clotting ailment, and eight reports of other clotting events associated with low blood platelets out of a total of 18.1 million doses given.

Last month, AstraZeneca did a review of more than 17 million people vaccinated in the United Kingdom and European Union, following the suspension of the use of vaccine in some countries over clotting issues.

AstraZeneca Plc said the review of safety data of people vaccinated with its Covid-19 vaccine has shown no evidence of an increased risk of blood clots.

“A careful review of all available safety data of more than 17 million people vaccinated in the European Union and UK with COVID-19 Vaccine AstraZeneca has shown no evidence of an increased risk of pulmonary embolism, deep vein thrombosis or thrombocytopenia, in any defined age group, gender, batch or in any particular country,” the company had said.