A year has passed since the outbreak of COVID-19. Many outdoor activities were restricted, and we had to live in a completely different way. Since the start of the domestic vaccination earlier this year, the government has aimed to immunize the nationwide population by November.Under these circumstances, the appearance of the vaccine seemed to calm down the situation.
However, as the supply of vaccines in Korea has been disrupted, the end of COVID-19 is expected to take a little longer. Due to a lack of supply, the government announced a plan to use the amount scheduled for the second round of vaccinations asthe primary inoculation. As competition to secure vaccine supplies intensifies in Korea and abroad, there are voices discussing the adoption of a new vaccine, Sputnik V of Russia. Turkey’s Health Minister Fahrettin Koca tweeted on April 30 that the emergency use of the Sputnik V vaccine had been approved. India, which is in turmoil due to a surge in confirmed cases of a new COVID-19 variant, has also approved and adopted Sputnik V for emergency use. Its first shipment arrived on May 1.
In Korea, vaccination anxiety is spreading after a series of side effects from the AstraZeneca (AZ) vaccine, previously approved and used. According to Reuters and The Guardian, the European Medicines Agency (EMA) stated that the AZ vaccine could cause a rare thrombosis accompanied by platelet reduction. These side effects were most likely to be at risk in people under 30. For these reasons, vaccinations against AZ under 30 have recently been suspended for safety reasons. Amid this shortage with jitters over safety, the introduction of a new vaccine is being discussed. It is hoped that the safety of the new vaccine will be fully verified to help end the long pandemic.
