General practice Prelude from Alphen aan den Rijn in the Netherlands accidentally administered a double dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine to about 150 patients on Friday.
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“We were very shocked when we discovered this error,” says general practitioner Ruud Gebel The Telegraph. “And of course we immediately asked ourselves: what are the consequences of this? Fortunately, these turn out to be very bad, according to the inquiry we made directly to the RIVM (the Dutch equivalent of health institute Sciensano, ed.) and manufacturer AstraZeneca. Patients may be left with more pain in their arm, but the double dose does not increase the risk of side effects. “
On Friday, the general practice vaccinated approximately 700 63- and 64-year-old residents of the municipality in a local vaccination center. “We work there with different types of syringes than we are used to in practice,” Gebel says. “That’s why it went wrong. I was in practice when a colleague said to me: we will go through the bottles very quickly. Then we discovered that it involved double doses. ” The GP immediately reported the mistake to the Health Care Inspectorate.
Understanding
While the vaccination campaign continued afterwards, with the correct amount of the vaccine, Gebel and his colleagues subsequently contacted the approximately 150 patients who had received their turn up to that point. “We have now been able to reach almost everyone. We apologized to all patients and explained that it has no unpleasant consequences. The people generally did not react angrily. Of course they weren’t happy with it either, but they sounded understanding and glad we called quickly. This is the maximum we can do. ”
The patients learned later that day that the Netherlands, as a precautionary measure, is temporarily no longer administering AstraZeneca vaccines in people under 60 years of age. “That came on top of that,” says Gebel. “Fortunately they don’t fall into that target group, that makes a difference.” Unfortunately for him, the news came in the course of Saturday that the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine will also be temporarily suspended for that target group… in order not to waste vaccines.
So far, according to the GP, no patients have received a double dose, reported with notable side effects.
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