Thread by @skdh

Everybody who is quoting the total number of thromboses in people vaccinated with #AstraZeneca to brag with their statistic skills needs to wake up. We're talking about an accumulation of recent cases of a specific type in close temporal order after vaccination.

Look, I am not saying that this is something to worry about -- I don't have any data. But maybe consider that the people who made this decision are not entirely stupid.

And since I am ranting already, let me point out that we'd be well advised to keep in mind the most important principle in all of science: Shit happens.

Governments all over the globe are rushing to try and vaccinate billions of people with a vaccine that must be produced and shipped at high speed. The vaccine itself might have been tried and tested. But sooner or later something will go wrong in the production line.

Yeah, I know there are loads of vaccine enthusiasts on twitter and trust me if I could get one, I'd take it immediately. But keep in mind: shit happens. Sooner or later a charge is going to be contaminated with something, somewhere.

For this reason I think, as much as I hate the delay, that governments in Europe who have temporarily suspended vaccinations with #AstraZeneca to investigate what's happening are doing the right thing. /end

Addendum: I notice that a lot of the English news reports don't mention that we're talking here (in Germany) about a normally extremely rare condition that might be time-correlated with the vaccination, please read the official press release by the PEI:

pei.de/EN/newsroom/hp…