It hasn’t been a good few weeks for COVID-19 vaccines. Over the last few weeks, a number of countries have drastically limited the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine due to blood clot fears in younger people. Now, the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has announced it is recommending all states pause the administration of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine due to blood-clotting issues as well—even though the reported issues are extremely, extremely rare.
Today FDA and @CDCgov issued a statement regarding the Johnson & Johnson #COVID19 vaccine. We are recommending a pause in the use of this vaccine out of an abundance of caution.
— U.S. FDA (@US_FDA) April 13, 2021
The FDA says that as of April 12, over 6.8 million doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine have been administered in the U.S. with six reported cases of “a rare and severe type of blood clot” in people who received the vaccine.
The FDA says the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) will convene a meeting of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) on Wednesday to review the reported cases and determine how significant they are. Until then, the FDA is recommending states pause the Johnson & Johnson rollout.
“This is important to ensure that the health care provider community is aware of the potential for these adverse events and can plan due to the unique treatment required with this type of blood clot,” the agency says.
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