Oh well… it looks as if the single-dose Johnson and Johnson vaccine for COVID-19 was just too good to be true.
Current Events
On Tuesday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Food and Drug Administration both recommended that the Johnson and Johnson vaccine be immediately halted after 6 people developed a rare blood clot only 2 weeks after being vaccinated.
“In these cases, a type of blood clot called cerebral venous sinus thrombosis (CVST) was seen in combination with low levels of blood platelets (thrombocytopenia),” the agencies said in a joint statement. “All six cases occurred among women between the ages of 18 and 48, and symptoms occurred 6 to 13 days after vaccination.”
According to a report from The New York Times, one of the women died and another has been hospitalized and is in critical condition.
“We’re recommending a pause out of an abundance of caution, but on an individual basis a provider and patient can make a determination whether or not to receive the vaccine,” Peter Marks, director of the FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, told reporters.
He added that although the “adverse events appear to be extremely rare,” the agencies believe it is in the best interest of public health to recommend an immediate pause until their investigations are complete.
So far, nearly 7 million doses of the Johnson and Johnson vaccine have been administered across the US. The agencies are requesting that anyone who received the J&J vaccine but then developed a severe headache, abdominal pain, leg pain, or shortness of breath within 3 weeks after vaccination should contact their health care provider.
New York State immediately reacted to the news by announcing that all Johnson and Johnson vaccine appointments will now get the Pfizer vaccine instead. Connecticut, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Nebraska, Ohio, Texas, Utah, Vermont, and Virginia have all since followed suit.
BREAKING: NY will pause the use of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine statewide immediately pic.twitter.com/fZaCTTOfSZ
— Morgan Mckay (@morganfmckay) April 13, 2021
“The safety and well-being of the people who use our products is our number one priority,” Johnson & Johnson said in a statement on Tuesday. “In addition, we have been reviewing these cases with European health authorities. We have made the decision to proactively delay the rollout of our vaccine in Europe.”
To date, the 2-dose Pfizer and Moderna vaccines both appear to be safe and effective.
NPR:
CNN. ABC News. The New York Times. Fox News.
Those are the publishers of four of the five most popular Facebook posts of articles about the Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine this week. They’re ranked 2-5 in total interactions, according to data from the tracking tool Crowdtangle.
Number one however, isn’t from a news organization. Or a government official. Or a public health expert.
The most popular link on Facebook about the Johnson & Johnson news was shared by a conspiracy theorist and self-described “news analyst & hip-hop artist” named An0maly who thinks the pandemic is a cover for government control.
It’s a stark example of what experts warn could be a coming deluge of false and misleading information related to the one-shot vaccine.