The World Health Organization (WHO) said on Thursday that Denmark is looking for options for sharing AstraZeneca’s vaccines with poorer nations. The concerns over a drug’s ability to create blood clots become stronger, Reuters has learned.
Denmark decided to halt the use of the AstraZeneca shots over concerns about rare blood clots. Actually, it is not the first country that prefers to abstain from using the controversial vaccine against the covid.
The WHO, which along with Britain and the European Medicines Agency (EMA) continue to recommend AstraZeneca’s shot on the grounds that the benefits outweigh the risks, has been pushing countries not to hoard vaccines that they are not using. Meantime, the lion’s share of AstraZeneca vaccines distributed globally, so far, have gone to wealthier nations like Nordic region, the UK and the USA.
“I did have this conversation with Dr. Soren Brostrom, director general of the Danish [Health Authority] yesterday and I understand that the ministry of foreign affairs of Denmark is ready to, or looking already into options, for sharing AstraZeneca vaccines with poorer countries,” WHO Europe Director Hans Kluge said.
Denmark’s top medical official has said his country had come far in inoculating the elderly population most at risk of contracting a serious form of COVID-19, and that younger groups were at lower risk of complications from the disease. That had to be weighed against the possible vaccine side effects.
