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Berlin (dpa) - In view of the beginning of the third corona wave in Germany, the virologist Christian Drosten regrets the developments around Astrazeneca with suspended vaccinations and scarce delivery quantities.
At the moment, the main thing to remember is that “we need this vaccination”, emphasized the Charité scientist on Tuesday in the “Coronavirus Update” podcast (at NDR-Info).
The epidemiological situation is currently not good in Germany.
The more contagious virus variant B.1.1.7 is becoming more and more prevalent, its share is now three quarters.
"Shortly after Easter we will have a situation like around Christmas," said the virologist, also with a view to the gloomy prognoses of the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) from a few days ago about a feared sharp increase in the number of new infections.
Drosten expects the situation to become "drastically more difficult" because of the mutant.
It will be particularly “tricky” for those aged 50 and over who are largely still unvaccinated.
Drosten had already issued this warning before.
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In Germany, the Paul Ehrlich Institute (PEI), which is responsible for vaccine safety, recommended suspending vaccinations with Astrazeneca.
According to data from the Ministry of Health a total of eight cases were with thrombosis (blood clots) in de in Germany until Tuesday evening
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reported cerebral veins in temporal relation to vaccination.
The number of cases is therefore statistically significantly higher than in the population without vaccination.
A few days ago Astrazeneca announced a drastic cut in its deliveries to the European Union.
The plan is to deliver 100 million cans to EU countries in the first half of the year, it said.
Most recently, the group had assumed 220 million cans by the middle of the year.
About the accumulation of rare thromboses within a short period of time, Drosten said that "of course you have to take it seriously and look at it".
This also includes looking for other possible causes.
Drosten said he did not want to evaluate the decision and did not have any background information.
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© dpa-infocom, dpa: 210316-99-851432 / 2
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