(VOVWORLD) -Germany, France and other European nations announced plans to resume using AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine on Thursday after EU regulators moved to shore up confidence in the shot, saying its benefits outweigh the risks.
Reports of rare brain blood clots had prompted more than a dozen nations to suspend use of the shot.
The European Medicines Agency (EMA) said after an investigation into 30 cases of unusual blood disorders that the vaccine’s benefits in protecting people from coronavirus-related death or hospitalisation outweighs the possible risks, though it said a link between blood clots in the brain and the shot could not be definitively ruled out.
“This is a safe and effective vaccine,” EMA director Emer Cooke told a briefing on Thursday.
Within hours, Germany said it would resume administering the AstraZeneca vaccine from Friday morning.
France too said it would resume use of the vaccine, with Prime Minister Jean Castex saying he would receive the shot himself on Friday afternoon.
Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi said Italy would do the same, and that his government’s priority remained to vaccinate as many people as quickly as possible.
Spain said it was evaluating a possible resumption, while Cyprus, Latvia and Lithuania said they would restart administering the vaccine.
The World Health Organization this week also reaffirmed its support for the shot.