One of the exceptionally rare reported cases over hospitalized people with blood clots issues after getting the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine is that of a woman from Pennsylvania. She was hospitalized in New Jersey and is the only one of the six people to have been released from the hospital so far.
All of the women who make up the six cases out of more than 7 million U.S. inoculations with the one-dose vaccine are under the age of 50, New Jersey Department of Health confirmed with NBC10.
The government recommended a pause in Johnson & Johnson vaccinations this week, not long after European regulators declared that the blood clots are a rare but possible risk together with the AstraZeneca vaccine, a shot made in a similar way but not approved for use in the United States.
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Health officials recommended the Johnson & Johnson pause in part to allow doctors to recognize and treat the unusual but dangerous condition. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said Wednesday that four of the six women affected by blood clots were treated with heparin, a blood thinner. The government is warning doctors to avoid the anticoagulant. Heparin common side effects include bleeding, pain at the injection site, and low blood platelets.
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So far, the Johnson & Johnson vaccine has not been an outstanding protagonist in the United States vaccination process. More than 122 million Americans have received at least one vaccine dose, and nearly 23% are fully vaccinated. Moderna and Pfizer are on track to have delivered 300 million doses each by mid- to late July. Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware are all following federal guidance by pausing Johnson & Johnson vaccines.
The blood clots complication comes as the worldwide death toll from COVID-19 approaches 3 million, including more than 560,000 who perished in the U.S., which continues to report tens of thousands of new infections every day and an average of almost 1,000 deaths.