Ireland and the Netherlands on Sunday became the latest countries to suspend the use of AstraZeneca vaccine over concerns about post-jab blood clots despite the firm insisting there was no risk, as most Italians were bracing for a new round of restrictions.
Three health workers in Norway who had recently received the vaccine were being treated in hospital for bleeding, blood clots and a low count of blood platelets, its health authorities said .
But no such cases have been found yet in the Netherlands the Dutch Health ministry said in a statement on Sunday.
So far more than 350 million doses have been doled out across the world, but countries including Denmark, Norway and Bulgaria suspended the rollout of jabs from the Anglo/Swedish pharma giant this week after reports of blood clots developing in patients who had received the shot.
The World Health Organization, Europe’s medicines watchdog, governments and experts have stressed that no causal link has been established between the vaccine and blood clotting and insisted that the shot is safe.
An AstraZeneca spokesman said it had found no evidence of increased risk of blood clot conditions after analysing reported cases from more than 17 million doses.
