“At this stage there is no indication that vaccination with the AstraZeneca vaccine should be stopped,” said Bogdan Kirilov, Director of the Bulgarian Drug Agency in an interview for bTV.

“The evaluation of the European Medicines Agency (EMA) shows that the risk-benefit ratio is positive, that is why the recommendation is to continue administering the vaccine in compliance with the decision for its use,” he added. “Next week the agency is expected to deliver an opinion based on the additional analysis of safety data.”

There is no categorical recommendation at this point regarding the second dose of the vaccine even though some countries are now considering replacing it with an mRNA vaccine.

Bogdan Kirilov stated that the Oxford vaccine is the only vaccine in which interest has diminished, but that in the past few days 500-600 people a day have been taking the vaccine.