A PAN American Health Organisation official has said there will be a short period of "limited access" to the Oxford-AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine due to shipment and manufacturing issues.

The Bahamas has administered over 15,000 doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine so far.

The country first received 20,000 doses as a gift from the Indian government and then another 33,600, through the PAHO generated COVAX programme.

Between both sources some 53,600 doses have been received into the country since March.

Dr Jarbas Barbosa, assistant director, PAHO, made the announcement during the organisation’s weekly COVID-19 webinar update, but assured the public that there will still be some access to the vaccine up to May.

“The AstraZeneca manufacturer in India had problems to receive the export licence to ship to other countries,” he said. “Also, because the AstraZeneca manufacturer in South Korea had to reduce their capacity to less than 50 percent for February and March shipments so we are trying to widen access through COVAX. AstraZeneca will begin to deliver to new manufacturing sites – one in Italy and one in Spain – which will increase production.

“Vaccines manufacturers have already committed 20 percent of the population of all participating countries. That is their commitment, but in the current trend where about 70 percent of shipments will be happening starting June, but by the end of April and in May we will still have limited access.”

Two days ago, the United States paused usage of the Johnson and Johnson COVID-19 vaccination after the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said it had to examine reports of rare blood-clotting disorder that emerged in six recipients.

Reports said that all six of the recipients were females between the ages of 18 and 48, and all developed the clots within one to three weeks of taking the vaccination. One woman in Virginia died, and a second woman in Nebraska has been hospitalised in critical condition.

The Tribune asked Dr Barbosa if distribution of the Johnson and Johnson vaccine has started in the region and what does the pause mean to the flow of vaccinations arriving.

He responded: “We haven’t started distribution of the Johnson and Johnson vaccine in the region. We will be starting to distribute it in June or July. We are in negotiations with the producer to establish the final agreement to receive the vaccines. It is important to clarify that when a vaccine presents all the data related to clinical trials, a lot of information is presented about the safety of the vaccine.

“When a vaccine is given authorisation for emergency use, they look into the data and the benefits of the vaccine outweighs any risk the vaccine can present. This is the same procedure that the regulators used for any vaccine or any medicine that is to be used by populations. Every vaccine can present some side effects. The problem is to see if these side effects are in a number that is acceptable.”

PAHO’s assistant director went on to downplay the pause on administering the drug saying it is a standard procedure and the benefits are far more than the risks.

“So, what we have with the Johnson and Johnson vaccine is very important evidence that the surveillance system identified,” he said, continuing. “We had a very small number of cases, very rare events that were detected. The United States decided to pause the vaccine use (Johnson and Johnson) for a couple of days while they review the data.

“This is a standard procedure. Remember in February we had a similar situation in some countries with the Pfizer vaccine. They paused the use and then after one or two weeks and when it was totally clear they started to reuse the vaccine. This is the process now. The benefits outweigh by far any possible issues. Let us remember that COVID -19 is a very severe disease that is producing hundreds of thousands of deaths in the world.

He noted that some 734,000,000 different vaccinations have been applied around the world.

More than seven million people in the United States have received Johnson and Johnson shots so far, and some 10 million doses have been shipped out to the states, according to data from the CDC.

Dr Carissa Etienne, director of PAHO said despite ongoing transmission in many places, restrictions have been relaxed, crowds are gathering, and people are taking public transportation, often without masks.

She said the region is not acting like it is in the midst of a worsening outbreak.

She said: “More people have been infected with COVID in our region in the last seven days than most of the weekly case averages we saw last year. And our weekly deaths outnumber those of any week in 2020. There are simply not enough vaccines available to protect everyone in the countries at greatest risk.”

She said she cannot stress enough that for most countries, vaccines are not going to stop this wave of the pandemic.

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