ASTRAZENECA WITHDRAWS COVID VACCINE

One of the world’s biggest pharmaceuticals has announced that it plans to withdraw its Covid vaccine.

Oxford-AstraZeneca said although it is ‘incredibly proud’ of the vaccine and the strides it has taken in developing it, the company has made a commercial decision to withdraw it.

It said there were several new Covid variants and this meant demand has shifted to the newer updated vaccines.

Developing a vaccine usually takes about 10 years in total. Pharmaceutical companies were racing against time to develop a vaccine so that the world could come out of the pandemic lockdown that made every country’s economy stand still. AstraZeneca managed to accelerate their process and developed the COVID-19 vaccine within 10 months.

AstraZeneca confirmed that the vaccine is no longer produced or provided to the market.

Since the vaccination programme was initiated, there have been several deaths around the world linked to it.

Image credit: The Hill