The Swedish Public Health Agency has decided to suspend COVID vaccination with AstraZeneca pending an investigation by the European Medicines Agency (EMA) over reported side effects, SVT reported.
“The decision is a precautionary measure”, – Sweden’s chief epidemiologist Anders Tegnell said at a press conference. He added that “it is important to suspend vaccinations until the EMA finds out if these events could be vaccine-related”.
The EMA said last week that it is investigating incidents of patients vaccinated with a single batch of AstraZeneca vaccine in a number of EU countries and who have later reported thromboembolic complications. WHO recommended that countries continue to use the vaccine.
A number of EU countries, including Austria, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Luxembourg, Denmark, Bulgaria, Norway, Iceland, Slovenia, Cyprus, Italy, France, Germany and Spain, have suspended the use of this vaccine, which has been authorized by the European drug regulator EMA to application in the European Union.