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Coronavirus Watch: Severe allergic reactions to vaccines still 'rare,' CDC says

Grace Hauck   | Paste BN

Severe allergic reactions to COVID-19 vaccines are still extremely uncommon.

In a pool of nearly 1.9 million first doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine administered in the U.S., there were 21 cases of a severe allergic reaction, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Wednesday.

More than 81% of them occurred in people with a history of allergies or allergic reactions, and most of the patients who reported having a severe reaction – 90% – were women.

"This is still a rare outcome," said Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director of the CDC's National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases. "We all would hope that any vaccine would have zero adverse events, but even at 11 cases per million doses administered – it’s a very safe vaccine." Read more.

It's Wednesday, and this is the Coronavirus Watch from the Paste BN Network. Here's more news that you need to know:

  • Second vaccine doses have begun to be administered in the U.S. More than 17 million total doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines have been distributed in the U.S., and nearly 5 million people have received a first dose, according to data from the CDC. See how many doses your state has administered.
  • Hawaii plans to use an online reservation system to vaccinate people to avoid crowds and long lines at distribution centers, officials said Tuesday. Dr. Libby Char, the director of the state Department of Health, said she wants to avoid having older residents wait in long lines to get vaccinated, as some have in Florida.
  • Georgia became the fifth state to report a case of the more contagious virus strain first identified in the United Kingdom, joining Colorado, California, Florida and New York. The state's Department of Health said the case was found in an 18-year-old man with no travel history. He is isolating at home.
  • As England enters a national lockdown, Britain's Office for National Statistics estimated one in every 50 people has been infected with COVID-19 in the week ending Jan. 2.
  • The European Union’s medicines agency gave the green light Wednesday to Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine, clearing the way for a final approval from the EU’s executive commission.
  • China blocked a visit from experts with the World Health Organization who were supposed to start investigating the origins of COVID-19 in Wuhan. WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a media briefing in Geneva Tuesday he was "very disappointed with this news."

Cases are rising rapidly nationwide: As of Tuesday, 49 states had more cases in the latest week than in the week before, an analysis of Johns Hopkins University data shows. The U.S. reached 21 million cases on Tuesday night, just over four days since reporting 20 million cases, and marked a new record for deaths in a day, with 3,775.

Today's numbers: The U.S. has reported more than 21 million COVID-19 cases and 358,000 deaths, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. Worldwide, there have been more than 86 million cases and more than 1.8 million deaths. See the numbers in your area here, and check out where cases are rising here.

– Grace Hauck, Paste BN breaking news reporter, @grace_hauck

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