TINA L. SCOTT
EDITOR
• On Apr. 13, most of the world hit the pause button on administering the Johnson & Johnson one-shot vaccine, after some recipients developed a “rare but serious” blood-clotting disorder. Reportedly, six women between the ages of 18 and 48 were affected; one of the women died, and another is hospitalized in critical condition. Expert advisors to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) need more time to assess the situation. Wisconsin is among those that will not administer the Johnson & Johnson vaccine until more information becomes available.
• On Apr. 19, Emergent BioSolutions stopped manufacturing the Johnson & Johnson’s COVID vaccine at its Baltimore plant at the request of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) after an inspection of the facility the prior week.
• The CDC is recommending people who were vaccinated “Contact your healthcare provider and seek medical treatment urgently if you develop any of the following symptoms: severe headache, backache, new neurologic symptoms, severe abdominal pain, shortness of breath, leg swelling, tiny red spots on the skin (petechiae), or new or easy bruising.” They are also urging medical personnel to “Maintain acute clinical awareness of symptoms that might represent serious thrombotic events or thrombocytopenia in patients who have recently received the J&J/Janssen COVID-19 Vaccine” including those symptoms listed above.
• Some countries are now dropping the Johnson & Johnson vaccine and the AstraZeneca vaccine from their vaccination campaigns. The AstraZenaca vaccine is not approved for use in the U.S.
• While the number of problems with the vaccinations are reportedly small, according to the CDC and the local health department, the problems are nonetheless cause for concern among people who have been vaccinated, as well as those still planning to be vaccinated. For other people, the problems have confirmed even more their decision not to be vaccinated despite the CDC’s position that “COVID-19 vaccines are safe and effective” and widespread urging that everyone age 16 and older should now be vaccinated.
• There are a growing number of individuals who oppose the COVID vaccinations saying, “This is still just an experiment, and you are the experiment. Everyone who enters into this is entering into the clinical trial; we are the clinical trial.” Alex Braskey, Clinical Nutritionist at Symmetry Natural Health in Wausau, is advocating for those who do not wish to be vaccinated.
“The news uses the term ‘Vaccine Hesitancy’ like a label for ignorant, uneducated, spooked, pious, anxiety ridden people who sit at home in the dark thinking everything will kill them,” Braskey posted on her website. “Vaccine hesitancy implies that it’s unfounded. I think it’s pretty healthy to be hesitant of an unstudied, completely experimental medical procedure that has the potential to do literally the opposite of what it’s intended to when the immune system is challenged with a wild virus after the initial injection creates antibodies. Which is exactly what happened in the animal trials.”
“I’m not hesitant. I’m informed. And observing the outcome of the experiments,” a person commented on the post.
“This vaccine was approved for emergency use,” Braskey stated. [It is not FDA approved as most drugs need to be, but only approved for emergency use.] “If we allow this to continue, why would any pharmaceutical company ever go through testing for a drug or vaccine ever again, if we’re setting a precedent that we don’t need to, we don’t care, we’ll be your guinea pigs, we will be the rats in this study.”