Volunteer part of trials for AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine dies

NEW DELHI: Agencia Nacional de Vigilancia Sanitaria (ANVISA), the Brazilian Health Surveillance Agency, on Wednesday, October 21, said that a volunteer who was part of a clinical trial of the COVID-19 vaccine created by AstraZeneca and Oxford University, had died. However, testing will be continued. Oxford University also verified the plan to continue the trials as there is no concern about safeness of the clinical testing. O Globo, a Brazilian newspaper, reported that the participant who died had not been given a trial vaccine but a placebo. Nevertheless, AstraZeneca refused to make any comments.

A source aquatinted with the situation told Reuters, an international news organization, that the testing would have been stopped if the volunteer who died had been given the COVID-19 vaccine. The Federal University, Sao Paulo, which is assisting the clinical trials in Brazil, also supported the continuation of vaccine trials. The university previously agreed that the volunteer is from Brazil, but denied to give more personal details. In a statement, the university added that no serious issues have been reported in any volunteer who is part of the vaccine trials.