UK to give under 40s alternative to AstraZeneca vaccine

The UK government decided on Friday to offer people under 40 an alternative to the AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine, reported Bloomberg.

The decision followed a recommendation from the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation and will be implemented just as the inoculation program is set to reach under 40s.

People under 40 will be offered vaccines by Pfizer-BioNtech and Moderna which, the only other shots that have clinched approval in the UK.

The offer comes after officials linked “extreme rare” incidents of blood clotting to the AstraZeneca shot in younger people.

A total of 79 cases had been recorded thus far, including 19 deaths out of the more than 20.0m doses administered.

The company said when the link was made that it was “working to understand the individual cases, epidemiology and possible mechanisms that could explain these extremely rare events.”