We have heard a lot about the Covishield vaccine causing blood clots in the brain and low platelet counts. The following is a comment by Andrew Gregory and Ben Spencer in the Sunday Times today. It is mainly about the roll out in UK. I don’t think we will get a definite answer right now. However the comment is worth a read

What you need to know about clots

Is vaccination worth the risk?
The chance of suffering a clot is one in 250,000. And the chance of dying as a result is one in a million. For young people the odds of falling seriously ill with Covid-19 may seem equally remote. But the older you get, the higher the risk becomes. And even among the young there are other consequences: long Covid is one; passing the virus on to a vulnerable relative is another.

The relative risks are demonstrated by the contraceptive pill, which is taken by millions of women. Roughly 250 in every million women who take the pill suffer a clot each year. Four in every million suffer a fatal clot — a risk four times that of the Oxford-AstraZeneca Covid jab.

I’ve already had my first AstraZeneca jab: should I be worried about getting my second?
No. There have been no clots reported after a second dose, suggesting that the tiny number of people susceptible to clots are struck on their first exposure.

France and Germany, however, have recommended that young people who have had a first dose of the AstraZeneca jab be given a Pfizer or Moderna shot as their second jab.

This option is not available in the UK, although “mix and match” trials are under way that might make this possible later this year.

I’m in my thirties, which jab will I get?
If you are eligible now (because you are a health worker or have an underlying health condition) you will be offered either the AstraZeneca or Pfizer jab. Other people in their thirties are unlikely to be offered vaccination before mid-May. By that point, regulators may have decided to ask people in this bracket to join those in their twenties in avoiding the AstraZeneca jab.

The decision will be made once most over-40s have been vaccinated, and will largely depend on underlying Covid rates. By then other jabs, including Moderna, may be available.

Professor Anthony Harnden, deputy chairman of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation, said safety data would be examined “in scrupulous detail” before the programme is rolled out to the under-40s. Nobody is offered a choice of which vaccine to receive.

Health