On April 13th, the CDC and FDA released a statement that recommended a pause to all Johnson and Johnson vaccines. The statement said, “CDC and FDA are reviewing data involving six reported U.S. cases of a rare and severe type of blood clot in individuals after receiving the J&J vaccine.”
The cases occurred among women between the ages of 18 and 48, and symptoms occurred 6 to 13 days after vaccination.
This “hold” caused a debate.
I reached out to IU students who have had the Johnson and Johnson vaccine and those who planned on getting the Johnson and Johnson vaccine to get their reaction to the news.
Ashleigh Yarnik, IU senior, was set to get her Johnson and Johnson vaccine on April 14. After the news of the hold, Yarnik got the Pfizer vaccine here on campus that same day. She said although she is not extremely worried about the news, she said she “would rather be safe than sorry.”She said that it also helped that IU had availability that same day.
Both Stefan Krajisnik, IU junior, and Jillian Seger, IU senior, expressed an initial reaction of shock, but did not express a lot of concern.
One IU junior, Claire Rosenthal, expressed how she thinks it was a good idea to hold the vaccination. She shared that her mother has had blood clots in the past due to birth control, so she takes this concern very seriously.