South Africa temporarily suspends rollout of J&J Covid-19 vaccine

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14 April 2021

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Pretoria, Apr 14 (Prensa Latina) South Africa has temporarily suspended the rollout of Johnson and Johnson (J&J) Covid-19 vaccines, its health minister said on Tuesday, after U.S. federal health agencies recommended pausing its use because of rare cases of blood clots.

In public address, South African Health Minister Zweli Mkhize told reporters that the immunization rollout of J&J vaccines was determined to be voluntarily suspended until the causal relationship between the development of clots and the J&J vaccines is sufficiently interrogated.

Our regulatory entities, Zweli Mkhize added, will collect information to that effect from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and other similar bodies to conduct an in-depth assessment.

The FDA on Monday recommended to suspended Johnson & Johnson vaccines in the United States, after six women under 50 developed rare blood clots.

These incidents happened between 6 and 13 days after rollout of J&J vaccines in women between 18 and 48 years.

It should be noted that so far more than 6.6 million US people have been vaccinated with J&J jabs in the United States.

Mkhize, however, stressed that there have been no reports of clots in South Africa after roughly 290,000 vaccinations.

He also said South African scientists are confident that the FDA's decision is taken as a precaution, and we hope this will not result in the complete withdrawal of the Johnson & Johnson vaccines from the market.