Health Canada follows European regulators in backing AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine

Canada’s health department on Thursday joined its European counterparts in backing AstraZeneca Plc’s COVID-19 vaccine, saying the shots were not associated with an overall increase in blood clots.

“Health Canada confirms that the benefits of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine in protecting Canadians from COVID-19 continue to outweigh the risks,” the regulator said in a statement.

“To date in Canada, there has been one report of a stroke that occurred in an individual following vaccination,” the regulator said. “This case has been assessed by Health Canada and determined not to be related to the vaccine.”

Earlier, the European Union said the vaccine was “safe and effective” and British regulators said its use should continue, after reports of rare blood clots prompted over a dozen countries to suspend the use of the vaccine.

Germany, France and other European nations have since announced plans to resume using the vaccine.

Health Canada also said it had assessed available data on the events and had determined the shot was not associated with an increase in the overall risk of blood clots.

The country is using AstraZeneca doses made at the Serum Institute of India. It has received 500,000 doses and expects to get 1.5 million more by May. 

As more states expand eligibility for coronavirus vaccinations, the pace of daily shots administered in the United States has steadily increased to a pace that is now 12 percent higher than it was just a week ago.

On Thursday, Illinois joined a growing list of states to announce they were widening the pool of people eligible to receive the vaccine, opening appointments to all residents 16 years and older on April 12.

“The light that we can see at end of the tunnel is getting brighter and brighter as more people get vaccinated,” Gov. J.B. Pritzker said at a news conference.

In Utah, which also announced Thursday that it was opening up vaccinations earlier than it had planned. “This is a significant movement in timing,” said Gov. Spencer Cox.

In Washington, it was a day for crowing at the White House.

President Biden said Thursday that the United States was a day away from reaching his goal of administering 100 million vaccine doses in 100 days — with six weeks to spare before his self-imposed deadline.

“We’re way ahead of schedule,” Mr. Biden said in brief remarks from the White House, “but we have a long way to go.”

Mr. Biden maintained that the 100 million-shot goal was ambitious, even though he himself he had conceded in January that the government should be aiming higher. And though the new administration has bulked up the vaccine production and distribution campaign, its key elements were in place before Mr. Biden took office.

As of Wednesday, the seven-day average was about 2.5 million doses a day, according to a New York Times analysis of data reported from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Mr. Biden’s comments continued his pattern of claiming unexpectedly fast progress in meeting his vaccine goal, even as public health officials have said that goal was less ambitious and easier to achieve than the president would have it.

Since Mr. Biden took office, 99.2 million shots have been administered across the country, the C.D.C. reported.

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Last week, Mr. Biden set a deadline of May 1 for states to make vaccines available to all adult residents. At least Maine, Virginia, North Carolina, Wisconsin and Washington, D.C., plan to meet that goal. Others, including Colorado, Connecticut, Ohio, Massachusetts, Michigan, Montana, hope to make vaccines available to all of their adult residents even earlier.