Oxford said the COVID-19 vaccine trial will continue after the volunteer's death

 

Oxford has shown its intention to go ahead with the test, declaring in its assertion that after careful evaluation, "there were no concerns about the safety of the medical trial."

A participant who died during an AstraZeneca Plc Covid-19 vaccine trial in Brazil did not receive the shot the company had, according to a person familiar with the matter.

The person requested anonymity because the information is not public.

Brazilian health authority Anvisa said it was informed on Monday of the death of the study volunteer and received a partial report from an international committee to assess the safety of the trial. Anvisa said in a statement that the committee had proposed continuing the trial.

AstraZeneca, which is developing the vaccine with the University of Oxford, said it could not comment on individual cases due to confidentiality rules and clinical trials. 

University communications chief Stephen Ross said in a statement that Oxford has no concerns about the safety of the vaccine trial, after an independent and careful review, and organizers in Brazil have recommended that the trial continue.

AstraZeneca's US depository receipts fell 3.3% in New York on Wednesday afternoon after the person was declared dead, but trimmed most of those losses in recent dealings.

American trial pause

The clinical trial of the vaccine has been suspended in the United States for more than a month. Studies stopped globally in September when a participant from the United Kingdom fell ill, but they have resumed in the UK, Brazil, South Africa and India in recent weeks.

 While pauses in vaccine studies are common, AstraZeneca and Oxford have faced pressure to reveal more information about the UK episode.

The stoppage of the US trial raised concerns about the prospects of obtaining one of the fastest moving shots in the world and highlighted the hurdles researchers face when developing a vaccine.

 Another vaccine manufacturer, Johnson & Johnson, said earlier this month that it was temporarily halting its trial to investigate a disease in one of the study participants.