THE worldwide vaccination programme against Covid 19 has been generally welcomed as having had a substantial effect, to our benefit, in the effort to cut down on transmission of the virus and on reducing the serial effects on the health of those who are infected.
So it is hoped that the programme will continue to have a significant effect in the battle to suppress Covid 19 to the point where we can look realistically towards the prospect of lifting the current lockdown and return – safely – to something like the normality we have not enjoyed since the start of the pandemic.
It is therefore concerning that the Irish authorities felt sufficiently concerned to suspend the the administering of the Oxford vaccine, one of the first developed in the search for an effective treatment.
The move was announced yesterday and came after news that a small number of people in Norway had been admitted to hospital with blood clots after receiving that particular vaccine.
The Irish Minister for Health, Stephen Donnelly, described the move as "precautionary" while the UK's Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) pointed out that "given the large number of doses administered and the frequency at which blood clots can occur naturally, the evidence available does not suggest the vaccine is the cause".
Ireland's Health Products Regulatory Authority (HPRA) said: "To date, the HPRA has received a small number of reports associated with blood clots following vaccination with the AstraZeneca vaccine.
"However, it has not received any reports of the nature of those described by the Norwegian Medicines Agency."
No-one has so far confirmed that there is a link between the vaccinations using the Oxford AstraZenica vaccine and the reported instances of blood clotting.
Further investigations will no doubt be carried out and when they are concluded it is important that people are given all the facts and that those facts surrounding an extremely complicated subject are explained clearly.
It is also worth noting that there were no deaths attributed to Covid 19 reported in Ireland yesterday. It is difficult to work out how much of this improving situation is down to vaccines or adherence to the lockdown measures still in place on the island.
It is important that all the guidelines are adhered to and that the advice of scientists is given the utmost consideration, including whatever scientific recommendation is made with regard to vaccines.
