The Anglo-Swedish company AstraZeneca will cut supplies of the coronavirus vaccine to the countries of the European Union (EU) by a quarter. Reported by Reuters.
A document circulated among European officials says that 30 million doses of coronavirus vaccines will be administered to EU countries in the first quarter of 2021, instead of the planned 40 million. At the same time, another 20 million doses will be delivered to the countries in April. May and June are not mentioned in the forecast.
The decline in supplies is caused by the difficulties associated with the operation of the global supply chain.
So far, nine European countries have stopped or temporarily limited vaccination with AstraZeneca due to thrombosis in their vaccinated patients. Austria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Luxembourg have stopped using the drug from a specific batch of one million doses, which was supplied to 17 European countries. At the same time, Denmark, Iceland and Norway have stopped all their supplies of this vaccine.
In total, according to the European Medicines Agency (EMA), 22 cases of thrombosis were recorded in the territory of the association for three million AstraZeneca vaccinated. The regulator does not link this phenomenon with the use of the vaccine, but the investigation of deaths continues.
