Vaccinated on Christmas Eve, dead five days later

Authorities in the Swiss Canton of Lucerne in the municipality of Ebikon, said on Wednesday that one of the first people to receive the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine in the country has died. Deutsche Welle noted that “the case was initially reported by a coronavirus-skeptic doctor”.

The first serious incident occured in the canton whose health director Guido Graf (CVP) wanted to be the first to start the Corona vaccinations. On Christmas Eve, vaccinations started on dementia patients.

The canton Lucerne was thus the site of the first vaccinations in Switzerland which was launched last week, with injections given primarily to elderly people. Switzerland has received 107 000 vaccine doses and expects some additional 250 000 per month starting next year.

On December 26, the resident complained of urethral and abdominal pain. He kept getting restless, his blood pressure dropped and his pulse increased. The doctor in charge examined the vaccine recipient one last time on Sunday evening, December 27. He was calm, but his stomach was painful under pressure. On Monday, the nursing home did not report on the patient’s condition. On Tuesday morning the doctor was informed by email about his patient’s worsening general condition. The patient had already died when the doctor was eventually called. The patient, apart from having dementia, had been considered healthy before the shot.

The canton has not yet released any detailed information about the man’s death. “We are aware of the case,” a spokesperson said, before adding that the death had been referred to Swiss drugs regulator Swissmedic.

Pfizer/BioNTech’s vaccine is the only vaccine which has been approved so far in Switzerland. The EU has has also approved the vaccine on an emergency-use basis, with the first jabs starting earlier this week.

This death follows the death of a vaccine recipient in Israel.  A 75 year old man from Beit Shean died Monday morning around 2 hours after receiving the Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine. He had waited for the customary time at the health clinic before he was released. But when he arrived home, he lost consciousness and was later confirmed dead.

Israeli health authorities denied any link to the vaccine however:  “Initial examination does not show a link between the unfortunate incident and the vaccination.”

The American drug control authority FDA (Food and Drug Administration) lists a number of side effects that can occur in the first few days in its fact sheet on the vaccine from Pfizer/Biontech. The focus is on acute allergic reactions, which now apparently also occur with the vaccine from Moderna, as the New York Times reported.

V-Safe , the reporting system for side effects of vaccines from the American disease protection agency CDC (Centers for Disease Control) shows a toxicity rate of 2,8 percent after five days for vaccination with the active ingredient from Pfizer/Biontech.

In the case of 112 807 vaccinations, some 3 150 “Health Impact Events” had occurred that made work impossible and had required medical treatment (as of December 18, 2020).

The CDC, apparently concerned by the high number of side effects, no longer publishes the figures.