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Health Minister Jens Spahn
Photo: FILIP SINGER / EPA
The decision of the European Medicines Agency (Ema) to further expressly recommend vaccinations with the corona vaccine from the manufacturer AstraZeneca has been positively received by numerous politicians.
In the evening,
Federal Health Minister Jens Spahn (CDU)
also gave the
green light for the renewed use of the active ingredient in Germany at a press conference.
It is now important to make up the four days lost by the vaccination stop, said Spahn.
At the same time, the minister defended the temporary suspension.
"Ema's analysis confirms our approach," said Spahn at a press conference.
"It was right to suspend the vaccinations with AstraZeneca as a precaution until the conspicuous accumulation of cases of this very rare type of thombosis has been analyzed."
The vaccine was "safe and effective," Ema boss Emer Cooke had emphasized at a press conference in the afternoon.
Although the Ema "cannot finally rule out" that there is a connection between vaccinations with the AstraZeneca vaccine and the occurrence of rare and dangerous clots in the brain, the agent is expressly recommended.
The benefit of the vaccine in protecting against Covid 19 disease outweighs "possible risks".
Ramelow and Dreyer want to continue the vaccination campaign quickly
Thuringia's Prime Minister Bodo Ramelow
(left) welcomed Ema's decision.
In his opinion, "trust must now be built up again," he told the "Thüringer Allgemeine".
He expects "that we will quickly start vaccinating AstraZeneca again in Germany," said the Prime Minister.
The
Rhineland-Palatinate Prime Minister
Malu Dreyer
(SPD) was ready to continue the vaccination campaign with AstraZeneca.
»The European Medicines Agency is considered to be a very strict control agency.
She checked the suspected cases, ”she tells the newspapers of the Funke media group.
With the approval by the federal government, the vaccination campaign in Rhineland-Palatinate will "pick up speed again".
Also
Bavarian Health Minister Klaus Holetschek
(CSU) wants to start vaccinating with the vaccine as quickly as possible.
The Ema decision shows that the vaccine is effective and safe.
The continuing shortage of vaccines also shows that one should be happy about the AstraZeneca preparation.
Several EU countries will resume vaccinations on Friday
Numerous EU countries, including France, Italy, Cyprus, Latvia, Lithuania and Bulgaria, had already announced before Germany that they would restart vaccinations with AstraZeneca on Friday.
The Ema report confirms that the vaccine is not only highly effective, but also safe, said
France's Prime Minister Jean Castex.
According to a media report, the AstraZeneca vaccinations in Spain will not start again until next week, Ireland will decide on Friday how to deal with the vaccine.
Before Spahn's official approval, some municipalities had already rushed ahead.
The
city of Düsseldorf
will start vaccinations with the active ingredient from AstraZeneca again on Friday - even if there should not be an official decree by the Federal Ministry of Health,
Mayor Stephan Keller (CDU)
announced at a meeting of the city council, according to the dpa news agency.
The district of Viersen also expressed itself accordingly.
The
health policy spokeswoman for the SPD parliamentary group, Sabine Dittmar
, was relieved by the Ema conclusion.
For the future, it is clear that “those willing to vaccinate must be properly and comprehensively informed about possible risks and exclusion criteria,” said Dittmar.
"It is now important that we turn on the vaccination turbo," said the SPD politician.
She called for outpatient medical practices to be included "immediately" in the vaccination strategy.
Andreas Glück, health policy spokesman for the
FDP
in the EU Parliament
, sees his stance confirmed by the Ema decision.
In any case, he had "not really been able to understand" the suspension of vaccinations with AstraZeneca in some EU countries.
Among other things, he considers the risks of all the uncertainty triggered by the temporary stop "to be far greater than the risks of the vaccination itself or the risks of infection," said Glück.
Doctors fear damage to the image of AstraZeneca vaccines
The
German Interdisciplinary Association for Intensive and Emergency Medicine (Divi)
is concerned about the possible damage to its image.
“Unfortunately, confidence in the vaccine has now suffered greatly.
It would therefore certainly be a good opportunity to make AstraZeneca available for volunteers who are not afraid and are not even considered in the vaccination sequence, "said Divi President Gernot Marx.
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fek / ssp / mbe / dpa