BY TYLER DURDEN
Adam Finn, professor of paediatrics at the University of Bristol and a member of the UK’s Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation, said the data generated “as many questions as answers.”
“The findings are somewhat unexpected, as concerns about rare cardiac side-effects—specifically myocarditis and pericarditis—have hitherto been particularly associated with mRNA vaccine second doses in males especially when the dose interval was short, whereas the signal reported here is primarily in non-mRNA first doses in females,” Finn said in a statement.
He said the overall data seems “reassuring,” and the increased mortality associated with a positive COVID-19 test result “raises the question whether the spike protein—which is expressed both during infection and following vaccination—is the cause.”
“The next and most pressing issue that needs to be addressed is to gather more detailed information on what the nature of the reported cardiac events actually was, as this would help us begin to understand what is really being seen in these figures and might help guide future policy and vaccine design,” he added.