Study done by the European Medicines Agency, announced on April 7, that AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine linked to blood clots that have formed in the brains of some vaccinated people. These blood clots have been formed due to the vaccine being incredibly rare. But owing to the criticality of the Covid-19 disease, which can put people in hospital with severe conditions, the benefits of the vaccine still outweigh the risks. Emer Cooke, executive director of the EMA said in a conference on April 7, that “they need to use the vaccines that they have to protect people from devastating effects” of COVID-19. The EMA had previously concluded that the vaccine which was developed by AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford had no signs of blood clots at that time. But the 18 cases made the experts worry about why the blood clots in the sinuses that drain blood from the brain is happening. This was a rare condition called cerebral venous sinus thrombosis or CVST.
The EMA’s Pharmacovigilance Risk Assessment Committee came to a conclusion, after having a strong review for numerous cases reported in the United Kingdom and the European Union, that enough data has now been accrued to implement the jab’s involvement in such rare blood clots, also known as CVST, and similar conditions should be listed as a possible rare side effect of vaccination. 62 cases of CVST out of around 25 million people who got the AstraZeneca vaccine, has been recorded till the date March 22. Also, there were more 24 cases where the blood clot was reported in veins which drained blood from the digestive system, called splanchnic vein thrombosis or SVT. The study on why the vaccine is causing the blood clot is still undergoing. Also, few people who took the vaccine reported an immune response that attacks platelets, making them clump together. Beverley Hunt, a hematologist at King’s College London said that, if the vaccine is the reason for the cause of the blood clots, then there surely might be a cure on it, and they will out it soon. Beverley Hunt also suggested a theory named IVIG. which has antibodies that interact with platelets, and is given with non-heparin anticoagulants in order to break up the clots formed by the vaccine. Few people also developed rare clots after getting vaccinated by other vaccines, for example three people in the European Union and United Kingdom developed them after getting Johnson & Johnson’s jab.
