MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – Mexican officials said they are studying the case of a 32-year-old female doctor who was hospitalized after receiving the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine.
The doctor, whose name has not been released, was admitted to the intensive care unit of a public hospital in the northern state of Nuevo Leon, after having seizures, difficulty breathing and a rash.
“The initial diagnosis is encephalomyelitis,” said the Ministry of Health in a statement released Friday night. Encephalomyelitis is an inflammation of the brain and spinal cord.
The ministry added that the doctor had a history of allergic reactions and said there was no evidence from clinical trials that someone developed inflammation in the brain after applying the vaccine.
Pfizer and BioNTech could not be reached immediately for comment.
More than 126,500 people died of COVID-19 in Mexico. The country began distributing the first round of COVID-19 vaccines to healthcare professionals on December 24.
Reporting by Noe Torres; Written by Laura Gottesdiener; Edition by Andrea Ricci