Occurrence of mild and common side-effects after a vaccine against COVID-19 is 90% of the total number in Bulgaria by October 28, 2021. The total number of reported side-effects in Bulgaria is 3456, where mild and common side-effects are considered to be muscle pain, arm pain at the place of the jab, temporary high temperature and anything similar.
Those were the answers of the Bulgarian Drug Agency to Factcheck.bg’s questions. The reason behind this research was the fact check of politicians’ statements, who claimed there are “1 million cases” of complications or death caused by the vaccines, as well as an introduced draft resolution in the European Parliament on the matter.
In the fact check (which you can read here) there is data provided by the French politician Virginie Joron, a member of the Identity and Democracy group in the European Parliament, part of Marine Le Pen’s National Rally party. Her motion for “a compensation fund for the victims of the COVID-19 vaccines” includes data that suggests the “1 million cases with side-effects” statement to be true.
“By October 28, 2021 the total number of reports of unwanted medical reactions, linked to the COVID-19 vaccines, is 749 979 from 574 700 000 doses,” announced for Factcheck.bg Maria Popova, director of the Study of Medicinal Safety and Clinical Trials Department at the Bulgarian Drug Agency. She clarified that the numbers given (by Virginie Joron) are different from official data given by the European Medicines Agency (EMA), which is public and available for everyone. Our research concluded the same results.
Dr. Popova’s answers confirm that there is no requirement by the European Union that the provided reports be medically validated. “Part of the reports are conducted by medical specialists and in some of the patients’ reports there is medical paperwork included,” she pointed out.
To the question whether or not we can compare side-effects from other vaccines, just as commentators have been doing in the public spaces, Dr. Popova stated: “Every comparison to the safety profile with the one of other vaccines must include the fact that with the COVID-19 vaccines the scope is incomparably wider, one that has not been conducted with neither of the already existing vaccines. The use of vaccines on a much higher number of people is an offset for a higher number of reactions, and for discovery of many rare unwanted medical reactions, which in a less used vaccine haven’t been found.”
Fact checked:
The data provided by the MEP Virginie Joron, member of the Identity and Democracy in EP, concerning that there are “1 million cases of people” with side-effects from a COVID-19 vaccine in the EU, is false. Moreover, most of the reported unwanted medical reactions after either vaccine in Bulgaria are mild and common.
Translated by Lina Chakarova
