Germany, Italy and France decided to stop the AstraZeneca vaccine rollouts on Monday and were later joined by Spain, Portugal, Slovenia and Latvia.
Amid rising coronavirus COVID-19 cases across the world, Germany, France and Italy on Monday (March 16) joined the list of Europena nations which have stopped the rollouts of AstraZeneca vaccine over blood clot fears. It is to be noted that these countries decided to stop the use of AstraZeneca vaccine despite World Health Organization's insistence that it is safe to use the vaccine.
Germany, Italy and France decided to stop the AstraZeneca vaccine rollouts on Monday and were later joined by Spain, Portugal, Slovenia and Latvia.
The WHO, however, asserted that it is not wise to stop the use of AstraZeneca vaccine, adding that the global health body had called a meeting of its experts on Tuesday to hold discussion over this matter.
"We do not want people to panic and we would, for the time being, recommend that countries continue vaccinating with AstraZeneca," WHO chief scientist Soumya Swaminathan said, adding, "So far, we do not find an association between these events and the vaccine," she said.
The European Medicines Agency (EMA) also said that it was better to het AstraZeneca vaccine jab than to not get the vaccine at all.
"The benefits of the AstraZeneca vaccine in preventing Covid-19, with its associated risk of hospitalisation and death, outweigh the risks of side effects," the agency said in a statement Monday.
Notably, the UK is still using AstraZeneca vaccine and it has not faced any problem so far.
In a related development, Italy imposed lockdown in major parts of the country with schools, restaurants, shops and museums closed.
In Germany, doctors appealed to the government to impose new restrictions in order to avoid a third wave as the British variant of COVID-19 spreads across the country.
A total of four vaccines, including Russia's Sputnik V vaccine, have been approved by the European Union so far.
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