- Denmark’s health authority on Thursday suspended use of AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine.
- There were several cases of blood clots among vaccinated people, it said.
- Denmark’s health minister said it wasn’t clear whether the blood clots were linked to the vaccine.
- See more stories on Insider’s business page.
Denmark has stopped using AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine because of potential serious side effects.
The country has halted use of the vaccine for at least 14 days after several cases of blood clots among vaccinated people, the Danish health authority said Thursday. One of these cases was related to a death in Denmark, it said.
Magnus Heunicke, the Danish health minister, said that it wasn’t yet clear whether the clots were linked to the vaccine.
In a statement, the Danish health ministry said that there was good evidence that the vaccine, developed by AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford, was both safe and effective, but that it must react to reports of serious side effects.
It was waiting for the results of an investigation by the European Medicines Agency (EMA), it added.
In a statement to Insider, a spokesperson for AstraZeneca said that the safety of its vaccine had been “extensively studied,” and that data showed the shot was “generally well tolerated.”
“Patient safety is the highest priority for AstraZeneca,” they said. “Regulators have clear and stringent efficacy and safety standards for the approval of any new medicine, and that includes COVID-19 Vaccine AstraZeneca.
“The safety of the vaccine has been extensively studied in Phase III clinical trials and Peer-reviewed data confirms the vaccine has been generally well tolerated.”
Denmark has also approved both Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccines. The health authority said that if it permanently suspended AstraZeneca’s vaccine, it would push back its vaccination plan by four weeks.
Five EU countries suspend one specific batch of AstraZeneca’s vaccine
The news follows five EU countries suspending one specific batch of AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine on Sunday as a precaution, following the death of a vaccinated person.
Denmark has completely suspended use of the vaccine, not just the specific batch.
In Europe, one person had been diagnosed with multiple blood clots in the vessels, and died 10 days after vaccination, the EMA said Wednesday. Another had a blood clot in their lung, and was hospitalized.
The EMA noted two other “thrombotic events” in people that had received the vaccines.
“There is currently no indication that vaccination has caused these conditions, which are not listed as side effects with this vaccine,” the EMA said, but added it had launched an investigation.
As of Tuesday, Austria, Estonia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, and Latvia had all suspended use of the batch.
The vaccine has been granted conditional marketing authorization or emergency use in more than 50 countries, including the UK and the EU. It has not yet been issued emergency use authorization in the US.
Insider has approached the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency, the UK’s vaccine regulator, for comment but did not immediately receive a comment.
Shares in AstraZeneca slipped by more than 2% after Denmark announced its plan to halt the vaccine.
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