Results . The 9 patients (8 female; median age, 36 [range, 22—49)…
Actually, one of the reasons I’m definitely holding back on this one is that there is an information gap here. It appears that these patients were vaccinated out of age sequence (ie, on the face of it, too young to be this far up the queue) - which may indicate underlying health issues. So far as I’m aware, nothing has been made public on this (beyond brief and uncommented information in this paper); and it may turnout to be a significant issue. So we’re waiting for further information.
Don’t know. Like I said, an information gap - and where we know something we have only the bare bones without an evaluation of potential significance. Of the 9 patients (8 female):
Two patients had pre-existing autoimmune disease (1 patient, demyelinating disease; 1 patient, antiphospholipid antibodies), and two patients had an underlying coagulation disorder (1 patient, von Willebrand disease; 1 patient, “unspecified coagulation disorder”).
Both hormonal contraceptives and hormonal treatments for menopause come with warnings about the risk of blood clots. Many women nonetheless choose to use them. The contraceptive insert kinda suggests that older women who smoke probably shouldn’t be taking birth control pills, though.
We know some did (but next to nothing has been published); for the others nothing was mentioned, but that doesn’t mean there were no undiagnosed conditions, for example.
Not that I’ve had much luck scheduling a vaccine but I would prefer the one with the least amount of clotting issues. I’ve spent weeks in the hospital because of blood clots so I have a greater concern for it on a personal level.
I would be pleasantly surprised if real information makes it into the public domain. They have to be very careful about how warnings are worded.
Hmm. I think the technical term for this is “Oh Shit”:
From the article:
The UK’s medicines watchdog says it has found 30 cases of rare blood clots in people who have had the Oxford-AstraZeneca Covid vaccine.
The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) says the risk of having this type of clot is “very small”…
…The MHRA said it had received 22 reports of cerebral venous sinus thrombosis (CVST) - where a blood clot forms in the brain - and eight reports of “other thrombosis events with low platelets [the cells involved in clotting]” following use of the Oxford-AstraZeneca jab, out of a total of 18.1 million doses given up to and including 24 March.
The FT reports that there were 7 deaths.
Why Oh Shit ? Well, when your pharmacovigilance system doesn’t report 30 cases of a very rare event until weeks after people have been telling you that this is definitely happening, it’s not a good look for your competence.
And to many people who were suspicious of the vaccination program in the first place… this is going to do nothing to persuade them that the whole truth about the vaccine is out there.
A “[UK] Government Response” from the 14th March was updated 16 March and withdrawn (and deleted from the MHRA website) on 18th March. It was replaced with this. I can’t find anything on the MHRA website regarding this latest story. Nor have I been able to track down the 14 March publication.
The reporting rate of this following vaccination in Germany has been 4 per million doses of the vaccine. In the UK, 5 possible cases of this form of blood clot with low platelets have so far been reported after 11 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine.
So this UK number is possibly pretty far off from reality, and definitely is far off from what Germany was seeing.
So we’ve gone from 5 to 30 (recognised) in less than two weeks. There are headline events - medically important, rare, AND everybody is talking about them.
It’s ugly.
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ETA - and now I really want to know what that deleted document said.
You have to factor in the groups who have been receiving this vaccine in the relevant countries.
The UK has been administering this vaccine in pretty strict age order, oldest first. Germany has restricted its use to lower age groups who may be more at risk of these particular rare clotting events.
I said early in this AZ/clots discussion that the “there are fewer blood clots among the vaccinated than expected background levels” line seemed very fishy to me. I’m actually really disappointed that I may have been onto something. It should be the case that there is extreme vigilance for side effects in a drug that received emergency approval to combat a pandemic.
It’s important to point out, as that site does, that Covid also causes blood clots. So the risk is still likely lower from getting the AZ vaccine vs going unvaccinated. But knowing the full risks is also critically important in making decisions between vaccines, or for short, low risk delays for a different vaccine. Both on an individual level and for governments deciding what to purchase going forward.
I predicted this at the start of the mass vaccination program. There was bound to be some identifiable issue with at least one of the vaccines, that’s pretty much a certainty and it is the same with any medical intervention of note.
In a period of vaccine scarcity the question still remains “do we save more lives with or without it, and what can be done to mitigate any problems” and to my eyes the process of vigilence is proceding exactly as it should.
People are just very wary of taking an action that purposefully exposes them to a known risk. Exposure to the virus itself is seen as bad luck or a quirk of nature whereas voluntarily taking on a risk of death, even if one in a million, is something to be avoided. The fact that the danger from the virus is much higher can be safely ignored. That’s humans for you.
Yes, but the danger varies greatly by demographics and state of health. I’m not as worried about getting everybody vaccinated as I am of getting the high risk people vaccinated.
I’m not really worried about getting the virus personally but will get the vaccine to stem the tide of it spreading.
Pulling a document is just a bad idea for public confidence. In the US at least it just gets re-released via the Freedom of Information Act. And it’s not something that can be buried in a dumpster drop. It’s going to be a very specific request that guarantees a quick response.
Yeah. I’m a long time industry vet, and even so I find myself fearing the worst (in terms of embarrassing (or worse) content, I mean.) Jesus, what would a conspiracy theorist think?