Ireland halting the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine

[Kaylasmum49]

This just came up on my phone. I had the AZ vaccine 10 days ago. I'm concerned about the news of blood clotting issues.

I think it's a political ploy from the EU, flexing their muscles over Brexit tbh. My in laws in their 70s one had Pfizer and one Oxford and nothing but sore arms. Hubby and I in late 40s both Pfizer and had fluey symptoms for 48 hrs. Other friends and family have had Oxford and no probs whatsoever. Every vaccine no matter what it's for carries a risk. It's the EU spouting clatrap and scaremongering.

@CuriousaboutSamphire

the discrepancy in reporting, reacting to the exact same issues with Pfizer is an oddity yet to be explained

Good point, no idea - More public interest/clicks to be had if "AZ" appeared in a story?

I think that whatever the outcome, this will do huge damage to the vaccine rollout. Mud sticks. It won’t matter as much here as we are so far ahead but in countries where a lot of vulnerable people aren’t vaccinated yet it’s going to cost lives.

[quote notimagain]@CuriousaboutSamphire

the discrepancy in reporting, reacting to the exact same issues with Pfizer is an oddity yet to be explained

Good point, no idea - More public interest/clicks to be had if "AZ" appeared in a story?[/quote]
Not the stories in the press. Government response, medical reporting.

Pfizer has pretty much the same data for clotting. Is there a country currently pausing Pfizer?

The WHO didn't say there were!

If the two vaccines elicit the same response then why the difference in government reactions?

@Plunger

There have been less than 50 cases of blood clots etc out of millions of vaccines administered which is lower or around what would have been expected in the general population without vaccine. Having worked in pharmaceuticals this is scaremongering possibly as an excuse for their poor roll out of vaccine within the EU? No vaccine is 100% effective. No medicine is guaranteed to not have side effects. Read the information leaflet next time you get a prescription and scare yourself silly! Are you going to stop taking penicillin because some people have an allergic reaction.

This. Excuse for poor roll out is what I thought of. Interestingly the Netherlands has suspended the vaccine, just as the Dutch go to the polls, in a country where a lot of people are angry about poor vaccine roll-out. One wonders if the suspension is a bid to shift blame and focus off government failure and onto a highly successful vaccine, rolled out far better in a neighbouring country.

Absolutely correct, not having the vaccine is far more dangerous as Covid does cause sticky blood.

Why do I think halting the use of AZ has something to do with sour grapes and Brexit!!! 👹

Who told you that you can't have vaccine yet and how long did they say to wait?

OP - best to read the guardian article explaining this.
Basically one - if you have risk of clotting issues having or not having a vaccine will have no consequence
Basically two - none of the countries suspending these vaccines are following agreed pharmaceutical rules in relation to side effects.
Basically three - ultimately it's your choice, no-one here can judge for it.
My tuppence - go for it

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/mar/15/evidence-oxford-vaccine-blood-clots-data-causal-links?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

Anyone who already had Covid in last few months and got through that unscathed should hold off having a vaccine at least until late Summer or not at all in my opinion.

my mum had the vaccine (don't know which one) and then ended up in hospital with a blood clot that blocked the arteries to her arm about 2 weeks later.

But she has a history of clots (pulmonary embolism a few years ago) & is bed bound so it's impossible to say it wouldn't have happened anyway.

But still... I worry about the second dose and will read up on the science before she has it, as far as a lay person can anyway.

If you check the Norwegian press you will find the issue is three health workers are in hospital with blood clots and low count of platelets. Similar in Austria. So its not just an issue of blood clots and statistics per million which can hide facts, its about a cluster which is unusual with blood clots and also low platelets which is a known side effect and caused the death of doctor in US and seen as one of the adverse events recorded.

Wanting less of something is fine but people should still be allowed to make a choice about whether or not to have a vaccine. Trying to guilt/scare them with ‘oh, but mutations!’ doesn’t really make sense in the current situation. The purpose of lockdown was to reduce pressure on the NHS. Vaccinating the people most likely to end up in hospital has done that. We should now be able to lift restrictions and get on with our lives and stop worrying about what other people are doing with theirs.

You're moving the goalposts now to saying it's about motivations to 'scare' people. Wanting people to know that comprehensive vaccination will help protect us all from mutations isn't forcing those people to be vaccinated or something designed just to 'scare' them. The fact is that mutations are a relevant risk and it is important that we take them into account and appreciate that the decisions we make can affect that risk. Immunity via infection might be fine for individuals, but if more than a minority of adults get it that way then it comes with an unavoidable increased risk of mutations.

Reducing pressure on the NHS is a long-term goal, not a short-term one. It's not truly, sustainably safe from covid until we reach a state where new strains appear only very slowly (so tweaked vaccines can keep pace). For new strains to appear very slowly, infection rates have to be kept low. That's why the vulnerable-to-hospitalisation group having been vaccinated against the current dominant strain is in danger of itself being only a short-term solution to NHS pressure, not a long-term one, unless vaccination levels in other groups keep going up and infections keep going down.

Some of the countries halting the program are not in EU. Its not about Brexit.

Partner and I had AZ on Saturday. We are now taking 75mg of aspirin daily as a precaution.

It is really not about Brexit. It's about concerns for their people.

Delayed roll out was also due to concerns for liability (shifting from tax payers to the companies).

Boris got lucky (which he needed)

Why do I think halting the use of AZ has something to do with sour grapes and Brexit!!! 👹

There's that rabbit hole I was on about.....

Az is the only not for profit one. Makes you think.

Ireland has in fact not yet given the go ahead to start AZ again (much to my dismay).

Northern Ireland is continuing but ROI is not

There is no threat this is milicious scate mongering.
Your more at risk from COVID its self especially from clots, organ issues or failures.
There has been 11 Million Zeneca vaccinations and there are no more incidents than normslly expected for the period which is good considering COVID its self is known to cause issues like that.

I did see the same comment for Pfizer thats not true either.

Only issue noted so far for Pfizer thst tbere has been a few allergic responses usually from people pre disposed to allergens.

Ireland havd probably halted theirs on the grounds they still have to abide by EU regulations, yes remember thst point EU regulation!

www.astrazeneca.com/media-centre/press-releases/2021/update-on-the-safety-of-covid-19-vaccine-astrazeneca.html

This might help ease your mind a little

Why do people automatically assume it's because of 'Brexit'? Honestly, have you seen the LIST of countries that have temporarily halted it??

I personally think it's a little bit "airing on the side of caution" but MAINLY another way for the government (I am Irish) to hide the fact that they're failing terribly with the rollout & they somehow think that this will make the public more patient with them🙈. Nothing to do with Brexit whatsoever.

Oh! No nice big headlines then!

Maybe tomorrow!

If you want to understand the science behind the blood clots associated with the vaccine you can look up Dr. Sucharit Bhakdi an expert who wrote an open letter warning about this issue. He has a video which explains I think it is on Rumble. Dr. Geert Vanden Bossche also very highly qualified ex GAVI has a video which explains the issue of variants and viral outbreaks. Little or no vaccine experts on SAGE just math modelers.

I'm in Spain and was supposed to have it last week, it got delayed until this week due to a computer error and has now been cancelled. I'm furious!