South Korea yesterday reported its first case of rare blood clotting linked to AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine.
The patient is a man in his 30s who got the shot on April 27 because of his job at a medical facility, Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) Director Jeong Eun-kyeong told a briefing.
He had a headache on May 9 and sought medical treatment before being hospitalized on May 12 as it continued, and he experienced muscle cramps, Jeong said.
“His condition has improved since then and we understand there is no big problem, though he still needs monitoring,” she said.
Jeong said that the symptoms are curable if detected early and treated properly.
About 3.27 million people in South Korea have so far received at least one dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine.
Reports from around the world have recorded extremely rare clotting, mainly a type of clot called cerebral venous sinus thrombosis, seen in combination with low blood platelet levels, called thrombocytopenia.
Medical regulators in the US and Europe have said there appears to be a link between AstraZeneca’s vaccine, as well as one made by Johnson & Johnson, but that the shots are safe and that the benefits outweigh the risks.
AstraZeneca has said it is working to understand individual cases and “possible mechanisms that could explain these extremely rare events,” while Johnson & Johnson has said that no clear causal relationship has been established between the vaccine and the clots.
South Korea limited use of the AstraZeneca vaccine to people over the age of 30 after the reports of blood clots.
The KDCA reported 430 new COVID-19 cases as of Sunday, for a total of 140,340 cases with 1,959 deaths.
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