Oxford vaccine will continue to be used in the UK, Johnson says
BORIS JOHNSON has said the UK’s medicines regulator sees “no reason to discontinue” using the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine despite several countries suspending its use.
The Prime Minister said the Covid-19 jab was safe and stressed that the UK’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) was one of the “toughest and most experienced” in the world.
It comes as Germany, France and Italy became the latest countries to suspend use of the vaccine following reports of blood clots in those who have had the shot.
Professor Andrew Pollard, head of the Oxford University vaccine group, said while it was right that regulators investigated reports of such side effects, data from millions of people was “very reassuring” that there was no link.
While on a visit to Coventry yesterday Mr Johnson was asked for his views on the news that Ireland and the Netherlands had paused the rollout of the jab.
Asked directly if he could tell the public that the AstraZeneca vaccine was safe, he said: “Yes, I can. In the MHRA we have one of the toughest and most experienced regulators in the world.
“They see no reason at all to discontinue the vaccination programme… for either of the vaccines that we’re currently using. They believe that they are highly effective in driving down not just hospitalisation but also serious disease and mortality. We continue to be very confident about the programme and it’s great to see it being rolled out at such speed across the UK.”
The German government said it was suspending its use of the vaccine as a “precaution” and on the advice of its national vaccine regulator.
According to the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control, Germany has received slightly more than three million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine and only used 1.35m doses so far.
French president Emmanuel Macron said France was also suspending use of the vaccine as a precaution and Italy’s medicines regulator has also announced a temporary ban.
The Netherlands, the Republic of Ireland, Denmark, Norway, Bulgaria, Iceland and Thailand have all temporarily suspended their use of the jab.
Last week, the World Health Organisation (WHO), the European Medicines Agency (EMA) and the MHRA said there was no evidence of a link between the jab and an increased risk of blood clots.
Professor Sir David Spiegelhalter, a statistician from the University of Cambridge, said the decision to pause the AstraZeneca vaccine rollout in some countries could be doing “more harm than good”.
He said: “I’ve looked at the AstraZeneca reports and they’ve said that 17m jabs across the EU and the UK (had been administered) and they’ve had about 15 cases of deep vein thrombosis and 22 cases of pulmonary embolism reported.”
We have one of the toughest regulators in the world. PM backed the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency’s view on jab.