The European Medicines Agency announced that the AstraZeneca vaccine is safe and effective against the coronavirus and is not associated with cases of thrombosis

AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine is ‘safe and effective’ and is ‘not associated’ with increased risk of blood clots, the European Medicines Agency (EMA) announced on Thursday after several EU countries suspended its use as a precautionary measure.

“The committee came to a clear scientific conclusion: this is a safe and effective vaccine”, Emer Cooke, director of Amsterdam-based EMA, said at a press conference.

“Its benefits for protecting people from Covid-19 with the associated risks of death and hospitalization outweigh the possible risks”, He said.

“The committee also concluded that the vaccine is not associated with an overall increased risk of thromboembolic events or blood clots.”

Cooke added: “If it was me, they would vaccinate me tomorrow.”

However, the EMA said it ‘could not definitively rule out’ a link with one type of bleeding disorder particularly rare and would update vaccine information.

In this regard, the doctor Sabine Straus, The chairman of the EMA’s vaccine safety committee said that after investigating individual cases of thromboembolic events in Europe, no increased risk had been determined. In fact, he claimed that the vaccine probably reduces the likelihood of these events. He also pointed out that although a causal link between the vaccine and thrombus formation cannot yet be determined, these events were extremely rare among some 20 million people vaccinated.

“At the moment, this is just speculation”, Straus said.

The European regulator has also not found “Proof of a quality or batch problem”, Straus said.

As more studies are conducted, a warning will be added to the patient’s package leaflet for the vaccine, with a description of these cases. “This information should be provided to health professionals and the public.… [junto con] signs and symptoms of concern so that early action can be taken to mitigate these risks, ”said Straus.

On the other hand, Cooke recalled that more than 2,500 people died from covid-19 in one day last week and thus the examination became the top priority of the EMA. He said the body had mobilized European experts for the review and member states had more information to support their policies, after several countries stopped providing the antidote.

The EMA, which had given the green light to the vaccine developed by the laboratory AstraZeneca and the Oxford University on Jan. 29, it coincided with the World Health Organization (WHO), which on Wednesday recommended continuing to use the vaccine.

Thursday the Medicines and Health Products Regulatory Agency British (MHRA) also said they found no direct relationship between the AstraZeneca / Oxford and Pfizer / BioNTech vaccines and thrombus formation.

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