1 IN 3 COVAXIN RECIPIENTS HIT BY ADVERSE EVENTS: STUDY

NEW DELHI/HYDERABAD: Nearly one-third of those who took Covaxin jabs suffered 'adverse events of special interest' within a year of getting vaccinated, claims a study in Drug Safety, an academic journal published by Springer International.

Common AESIs reported include upper respiratory tract infection, new onset skin and subcutaneous (beneath the skin) disorders and musculoskeletal disorders. Menstrual abnormalities, the study claims, were noticed in 5% of women who took Covaxin, the Covid-19 vaccine developed by Hyderabad-based Bharat Biotech.

The Drug Safety study comes amid controversy over pharma giant AstraZeneca's admission in a UK court that its Covid-19 vaccine technology, used by the Serum Institute of India to develop Covishield, could, in very rare cases, cause blood clot with low platelet count which is also referred to as 'thrombosis with thrombocytopenia syndrome (TTS)'.

Covaxin was the second most used Covid-19 vaccine in India, after Covishield.

According to the study, in which researchers from the Institute of Medical Sciences called up 926 Covaxin recipients and enquired about long-term AESIs after a year of vaccination, viral upper respiratory tract infections were reported by 304 (48%) adolescents and 124 (43%) adults in this period.

Bharat Biotech, in its reaction, said for such a study in safety to be informative and to avoid bias, various data points were required to be taken into consideration.