Concerned about having second jab of AstraZeneca

[LuluJakey1]

I have read all of the stuff about AstraZeneca and blood clots and felt the EU was making a fuss about something the WHO and EMA were saying was not a significant issue.
However, I have become increasingly worried over the last few days when further reports have emerged. They are all linked to AstraZeneca, not to Pfizer.
This is in The Independent which is the first time I have read of the medical profession here recognising it as an issue and warning Drs about it.
www.independent.co.uk/news/health/coronavirus-astrazeneca-vaccine-blood-clotting-doctors-b1826144.html
It raises some very interesting points.

I am worried about having the second jab. I am now feeling the government are trying to sweep it under the table' because they have bought so many doses and could not vaccinate everyone without using AZ.
AIBU to be considering not having the second jab?

What I would like to do is leave it for a while and then have two doses of Pfizer. Does anyone know if that is even medically possible?

You've already had one jab so it will make no difference.

1 in 2.5 million = The number of people who will die from a blood clot after an AZ vaccination is (note: after, not due to as there is no proof)

2500 in 2.5 million = The number of people who die as a result of getting covid. We already know that covid causes blood clots.

So you're 2500 times more likely to die from covid than as a result of getting a blood clot after a vaccination. Source: BBC

211 deaths in 2019 from paracetamol poisoning. I'm sure you still take it.
www.statista.com/statistics/471227/death-by-paracetamol-drug-poisoning-in-england-and-wales/

Get vaccinated properly and do not be put off by press sensationalizing - their job is to get clicks.

Does anyone know if it is possible for me to wait a while and have a full course of Pfizer?

I had my first AZ last week. Felt like shit for a couple of days but I will be having the second one. I'm 59.

Has anyone’s actually died from these blood clots? Or are they fairly treatable?

It’s almost as if you haven’t read the statistics. If you want a blood clot, get COVID.

@LuluJakey1

Does anyone know if it is possible for me to wait a while and have a full course of Pfizer?

Pfizer have also had blood clots reported but Pfizer isn't being rubbished by the EU.

Reports say that the benefits from the vaccine far outweigh any risk.

I’m a woman in my 30s, and I was very excited to get my first dose of AZ last week, and I will absolutely be keeping my appointment for the second.

The risk is so absolutely vanishingly small, but you are 2000x more likely to die as a result of complications from covid. Can’t you just balance the risks?

As an aside, most of us, as women, will have taken over-the-counter medicines in our lives that will never have been tested on women... none of us seem to worry much about that.

There have been people who had Pfizer and developed blood clots. Again, you can't prove they got the blood clot because of the Pfizer vaccine so don't worry - the chances of being unvaccinated and developing the blood clot is higher than having the vaccine and developing blood clots.

Let’s not forget there have Been 4 million cases of covid in the UK with 125000 deaths, so 1 in 32 people who Get covid risk dying, wheras 7 people have died from the reported bloodclot complications which is roundly calculated to 1 in 2.5 million

Druid Not these brain blood clots it hasn't. Both Pfizer and AZ have had other more common blood clots reported. I am not concerned about those blood clots. It is this specific very dangerous brain blood clot I am worried about.
Mylovelyhorse Yes, 7 women in Britain have died from this specific blood clot.

@LuluJakey1

Does anyone know if it is possible for me to wait a while and have a full course of Pfizer?

Of course you can’t do that. You don’t get to pick and choose what vaccine you have, and thankfully you can’t pay to ensure your preference either.

I am not due my second jab for 4 weeks. I think I will see what happens in the next 4 weeks and decide then.

I work in a vaccination centre- just volunteer, not medical- and have been sure AZ was safe but am having real doubts after reading the article I linked to above from The Independent.

I will probably have the jab but am concerned.

Funny how the non profit vaccine is coming under increased fire, something sounds fishy to me!

This, this and thrice this ^

In the UK 30 blood clots in 18 million doses given, works out 1 in 600,000

This. And 1 in 66 has long covid (and it's actually a much higher figure as that is based on the population of the UK, a lot of whom haven't even had covid).

You've had one dose so you're partially protected. It's entirely up to you but I know what risk I think is the greater one.

I am massively pro vaccination and would have been first in the line for the Astra vaccine. But I have many questions after the latest data from the MHRA. They’ve been asked by journalists for a breakdown by age and sex and haven’t provided it yet. But in Germany it is overwhelmingly women aged 30-50 who have been affected (a similar situation playing out in other countries). The UK has given millions of Astra doses but largely to older people, whereas other European countries wouldn’t give Astra to older people (because there were so few over 65s in the trial) so younger EU people have tended to be given Astra - and then are reporting a high rate of CVST. The UK data suggests Astra works really well - but the population has been older. We also know that female responses to medicine and illness is not the same as men. I’d like to know the breakdown of those cases in the UK - were they mostly women aged 30-50? And if that’s the case, I would like to have a better understanding of just how much the vaccine potentially increases the risk of CVST compared to the regular (similar-aged) population, and whether that increased risk is worth it versus the risk of a 30 year old being seriously ill or dying with covid. And at the end of the day, we have other types of covid vaccines, so is Astra the right vaccine to give that group of women until we know more? There are side effects to all medicine, but it’s useful to know what they are so that doctors and people can make informed decisions. The Astra vaccine had been great in the UK, but I am deeply uncomfortable with the lack of data provided on the sex/age breakdown for CVST. And I wonder if it was men in their 30s and 40s dying, whether this would be getting more attention?

I would still want vaccine even if ten times more blood clots as still very rare and I don't want Covid and having the jabs will get us out of lockdown. You won't be allowed to choose your vaccine type and very unlikely to get 2 more vaccines. AZ is made in UK do we get more of it than Pzifer made in EU. EU are now blocking Pzifer jabs from leaving the EU.

My fit and healthy brother in law who is in 53 had one of these blood clots out of the blue last October. He was hospital for almost 2 weeks in height of pandemic. He had not had any vaccines at that point. These things just happen sometimes. He still had Vaccine when his turn came up. As it happens he had Pzifer but he would have taken AZ if that was the one offered.

@Boopeedoop

Do you take the contraceptive pill? Fly on a plane?

Both are significantly more likely to cause a blood clot.

This in spades.

So there is likely to be a shift in attitudes, and more people like the OP will opt to delay and await an alternative vaccination, due to their own reasoning surrounding risk. Fine.

But for people who are vaccinated, it is simply unfair to ask us to wait at home until the increased demand for alternative vaccines is fulfilled, or nearly so.

My family don't want AZ. Before, it was because it's the cheap one the gov are shoving at us, now, it's the link to blood clots. These same people will call vaccine passports unfair and further lockdowns/attempts to control outbreaks they'll say is 'just not on'. Well, feck that. I wasn't for vaccine passports before, but I am now.

The UK’s medicines regulator said it had identified 30 cases out of more than 18 million doses of the vaccine. Seven of the cases were fatal

But most of those 18 million weren't women between tge ages of 30 and 50, were they? Because apparantly they are at risk. So what is the percentage then if you are a woman in your 30s, 40s and 50s? Because I'm guessing that there aren't that many that were vaccinated yet.

*Do you take the contraceptive pill?
Fly on a plane?

Both are significantly more likely to cause a blood clot.*

No to the first and take an asprin and wear pressure socks in a plane in the hope that it'll help. And for the pp who said that we all take medication which isn't tested on women and don't question it: I have been questioning that (and refusing some medication because of it) since circa 1994. I also always washed my hands when having been outside decades before Covid. Some of us do think about these things you know. And I don't have OCD or anything (if anything I believe that a little dirt is good for you).

@LuluJakey1

Does anyone know if it is possible for me to wait a while and have a full course of Pfizer?

I dont think you can pick and choose your vaccine? They dont even tell you till you are there

True, but nurses are painting a very different picture and I am inclined to believe them

What nurses are these? Presumably they must be a fairly eminent group if you’d rather believe them that the national regulatory body.

1 in 1,000 people in the UK will have a blood clot every year.

1 in 600,000 will have a blood clot after AstraZeneca.

They should just about be giving out the vaccine to prevent blood clots with these kinds of statistics.

I'll have yours if you don't want it op