Johnson & Johnson continues market launch

After approval by the EU Medicines Agency, Johnson & Johnson will continue delivering its corona vaccine. Germany, which is waiting for more than 36 million vaccine doses, will also benefit from this. The US manufacturer Johnson & Johnson wants to continue the market launch of its corona vaccine in Europe. The company announced after the EU medicines authority EMA gave the green light for the preparation. The pharmaceutical company announced a week ago that it would initially delay the market launch in Europe because there were reports of sinus vein thrombosis in the USA. “The safety and health of the people who use our products is our number one priority,” said Paul Stoffels, chief scientist at Johnson & Johnson. Deliveries to the EU as well as Norway and Iceland would start again. The package insert for the vaccine will be updated, and the employees of the medical facilities in which the active ingredient will be used should also be specifically informed.

EMA thinks vaccine is safe

The EMA had previously confirmed that the vaccine could indeed cause blood clots in very rare cases. But the possibility of blood clots with a very low number of platelets is only registered as a rare side effect. According to the experts, most of the cases involved women under 60 years of age. Therefore, the authority reiterated that the benefits of the vaccine to prevent Covid-19 should be rated higher than the risks of side effects. It was the second time that the EMA re-examined a corona vaccine after approval. Cerebral vein thrombosis had also occurred with the active ingredient in AstraZeneca. Here, too, the EMA stuck to its assessment that the vaccine was safe.

36.7 million vaccine doses for Germany

In the EU, delivery of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine only started last week. Numerous EU countries followed the manufacturer’s recommendation to wait for the EMA experts’ report before using it. The EU Commission has already ordered vaccination doses for 200 million people. Of these, 36.7 million vaccination doses are to be delivered to Germany and thus accelerate the vaccinations. Nationwide, according to registration data, 20.2 percent of the population have now been vaccinated at least once, according to the Robert Koch Institute (RKI). According to this, around 16.8 million people were vaccinated once, and around 5.6 million more received full protection with a second dose. Ten of the 16 federal states have already reached the 20 percent mark for first vaccinations.