There are no plans to recall the AstraZeneva vaccine: Bulgarian Drug Agency director

“There are no plans to recall the AstraZeneva vaccine,” said Bulgarian Drug Agency Director Bogdan Kirilov for BNT. He advised the people vaccinated with a first dose of AstraZeneca who did not have severe adverse effects after the first shot, to wait 84 days and then consider taking the second dose. “For a vaccine to be recalled there has to be data showing there is a problem with effectiveness, safety and quality, but the vaccine has been approved by the European Medicines Agency. At this stage data shows a positive benefits-risk ratio, the vaccine can be administered and it is, therefore, being administered,” Kirilov added. 

2,096 new daily coronavirus cases, 15% of tests performed

2,096 is the number of newly registered Covid-19 cases in Bulgaria out of 13,800 tests performed in the past 24 hours. The coronavirus positivity rate stands at 15.2%, Single Coronavirus Information Portal data show. The highest number of new infections is once again in Sofia – 437, followed by Plovdiv - 227, Burgas - 183 and Varna with 163 newly registered cases. 61,120 is the number of active cases, 8,598 Covid-19 patients are being treated in hospital, 765 of them in intensive care. 106 have died, the number of recoveries in the past 24 hours is 3,351.

Mass vaccination continues

11, 876 vaccine doses were administered on 20 April, bringing the number of vaccinations up to 657,333. 135,377 have received their second dose of vaccine. 

Compiled by: Gergana Mancheva and Radio Bulgaria’s news team

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