The Standing Committee on Vaccination at the Robert Koch Institute in Germany (RKI), the country’s leading public health authority, concluded that there is insufficient data on the vaccine’s effectiveness for this age group, according to a ministry statement.
“It is not possible to make a statement about the effectiveness of the AstraZeneca vaccine in people over 65 years of age,” said the statement.
The German decision comes amid an ongoing dispute between the European Union and AstraZeneca over delays in delivering its coronavirus vaccine to the bloc.
AstraZeneca said it cannot deliver as many doses as the EU expected, citing production challenges. But the European Commission, which ordered the vaccine on behalf of EU member countries, says this is unacceptable, and the drugmaker must find a way to increase supply.
So far, the EU has ordered 300 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine – which can be approved for use by the European Medicines Agency as early as Friday – with an option to purchase an additional 100 million doses.
Belgian health authorities – at the request of the European Commission – carried out an “inspection” at AstraZeneca’s Belgian production facilities on Wednesday “to ensure that the delay in delivering vaccines is in fact due to a production problem at the Belgian facility “. France Dammel, spokesman for Belgian Health Minister Frank Vandenbroucke, said in a statement.
“Belgian experts are analyzing the elements obtained during this inspection visit, together with Dutch, Italian and Spanish experts,” said Dammel, adding that the report is expected in a few days.
The German government expects the country to face a shortage in the supply of the coronavirus vaccine for at least another 10 weeks, Health Minister Jens Spahn said on Thursday amid adverse reactions to the pace of the distribution program for the government vaccine.
Meanwhile, the number of coronavirus infections per 100,000 residents in seven days in Germany fell below the critical threshold of 100 for the first time in three months, to 98, the RKI said on Thursday.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel described the government plan to reduce the incidence rate to less than 50 new infections per 100,000 residents within seven days in order to track infections.
CNN’s Nadine Schmidt reported from Berlin and Laura Smith-Spark wrote from London.