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WASHINGTON– In yet another obstacle for Johnson & & Johnson’s coronavirus vaccine, the Food and Drug Administration on Thursday restricted its use to grownups who can not or refuse to get the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccines, citing security issues.

The company said 60 cases of a rare but major blood-clotting condition have actually been identified, consisting of 9 deaths, out of about 18 million doses administered. The action happens five months after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommended Moderna’s and Pfizer’s vaccines over Johnson & & Johnson’s for booster shots.

The F.D.A. stated that weighing the dangers of Johnson & & Johnson’s vaccine against the advantages, it had chosen to restrict its use to adults who can not access Pfizer’s or Moderna’s vaccines, or for whom those shots are not “scientifically proper.” One example would be people who experienced an extreme allergy to the other two vaccines, the firm stated.

It said the vaccine might also be given to grownups who “would otherwise not receive a Covid-19 vaccine.”

Johnson & & Johnson was eclipsed long ago by Pfizer and Moderna in the country’s vaccination campaign; federal officials have said the mRNA vaccines produced by those business are both safer and more reliable. In a declaration, Johnson & & Johnson stated the F.D.A.’s action reflected the already-known risk of the negative effects, not new information on the rate at which it happens. But in a sign of the firm’s own flagging interest in its vaccine, it has stopped offering sales outlooks for the shot to financiers.

Reports that the vaccine can activate a condition called thrombosis with thrombocytopenia syndrome have bedeviled it from early on. In April 2021, not long after it was authorized for emergency situation usage, federal authorities stopped briefly circulation of the vaccine for a security evaluation. Regulators raised the pause 10 days later but added a warning to directions for its use.

In December, the C.D.C. suggested that adults seeking a booster shot choose Moderna or Pfizer rather of Johnson & & Johnson, pointing out more benefits and lower threats. Combined with a host of producing troubles in the United States, some professionals said, the firm’s judgment showed that the federal government had all but crossed out Johnson & & Johnson’s vaccine.

According to the F.D.A. announcement on Thursday, federal authorities now have 60 reports of the blood-clotting condition– or four times as numerous as were reported when in 2015’s pause in distribution was raised. In the interim, the variety of Johnson & & Johnson doses administered has somewhat more than doubled, while the variety of Pfizer and Moderna recipients has actually escalated.

The number of deaths credited to the condition triggered by the Johnson & & Johnson’s vaccine does not appear to have actually risen much, if at all. However there have been far less, if any, believed deaths due to side effects from the mRNA vaccines, federal health authorities have said.

In its announcement, the F.D.A. cited more than 6 cases and near one death attributed to the blood-clotting disorder for each two million shots of Johnson & & Johnson vaccine administered in the United States.

About 17 million Americans have now gotten one dosage of Johnson & & Johnson’s vaccine, and another 1.5 million have actually gotten a booster dosage, according to the C.D.C.’s data. By comparison, more than 200 million Americans have gotten at least two doses of either Moderna’s or Pfizer’s vaccine.

Trying to cast the tight new limitations in a favorable light, Johnson & & Johnson said: “Data continue to support a favorable benefit-risk profile for the Johnson & & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine in grownups, when compared with no vaccine.”