Alberta dropping minimum age for Astrazeneca jab

Kenney announces move to 40 from 55 as province reports 1,516 new infections

Alberta Premier Jason Kenney says the province will be lowering the minimum age to receive the Astrazeneca COVID-19 vaccine to 40 years old from 55.

Kenney made the announcement Sunday on Twitter and promised to provide more details this morning. He said bookings will be open on Tuesday.

“This decision is based on growing scientific knowledge about the vaccine and is based on (the Alberta chief medical officer of health's) advice,” Kenney tweeted.

The province reported 1,516 new infections on Sunday, bringing the total number of active cases to 17,935. These numbers are similar to what the province experienced in December, which peaked at 20,972 active cases on Dec. 13.

There are 451 people in hospital, with 103 of those in intensive care. The last time that intensive care numbers surpassed 100 was on Jan. 29. Three more deaths raised that toll to 2,040.

The province also reported 800 new cases of variants of concern, which now make up 54.5 per cent of all active cases.

More than 1.1 million doses of vaccine had been administered as of Saturday.

On Saturday, Alberta's chief medical officer of health, Dr. Deena Hinshaw, confirmed Canada's second case of a blood clot linked to the Astrazeneca COVID-19 vaccine.

Hinshaw said a case of a rare blood clot disorder, known as vaccine-induced immune thrombotic thrombocytopenia (VITT), was confirmed in a man in his 60s. He is receiving treatment and recovering, and to protect patient confidentiality, no further details were available.

Hinshaw said the province is taking this extremely seriously, but the risk assessment hasn't changed and she continues to encourage Albertans who are eligible to take the Astrazeneca vaccine.

“These blood clots remain extremely rare and anyone who was aged 55 and older faces much higher risks for COVID-19 infection than from this vaccine,” she said.

The Alberta case of VITT is the second in Canada out of more than 700,000 doses of the Astrazeneca vaccine that have been administered to date.

“Global frequency of VITT has been estimated at approximately one case in every 100,000 to 250,000 doses of vaccine,” Hinshaw said.

“By comparison, Albertans 55 and older who are diagnosed with COVID-19, have a one-in-200 chance of dying from that infection. They are also at least 1,500 times more likely to be hospitalized from COVID-19 than experience VITT after getting Astrazeneca.”

Meanwhile, the British Columbia government announced Sunday that all adults, 18 years and over, could register for a vaccine starting this week.

The registration schedule is agebased, starting with 40 years old and up on Monday and ending with 18 and up on Friday.

B.C.'S announcement follows comments made by federal Health Minister Patty Hajdu during a Sunday news conference in which she said provinces and territories “are free to use Astrazeneca” in any age group.

“The National Advisory Committee on Immunization (NACI) provides recommendations based on the current evidence and evolves their advice as new evidence as comes in,” she said. “They are reviewing Astrazeneca advice now and will have an update in the near future.”