Former President Donald Trump said the federal government is doing a “terrible disservice” to Americans by halting usage of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, while saying it may have been halted due to “possibly political reasons.”
It came after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommended a pause in using the J&J COVID-19 shot.
“The results of this vaccine have been extraordinary but now it’s [sic] reputation will be permanently challenged. The people who have already taken the vaccine will be up in arms, and perhaps all of this was done for politics or perhaps it’s the FDA’s love for Pfizer,” Trump said in a statement released by his office, referring to the vaccine made by Pfizer.
Trump added: “Remember, it was the FDA working with Pfizer, who announced the vaccine approval two days after the 2020 Presidential Election. They didn’t like me very much because I pushed them extremely hard.”
“The FDA, especially with long time bureaucrats within, has to be controlled,” the former commander-in-chief said, adding that “they should not be able to do such damage for possibly political reasons, or maybe because their friends at Pfizer have suggested it. They’ll do things like this to make themselves look important.”
“Until that process is complete, we are recommending a pause in the use of this vaccine out of an abundance of caution,” the two health agencies said, as officials said later that a meeting is scheduled Wednesday to discuss the clotting cases. “This is important, in part, to ensure that the health care provider community is aware of the potential for these adverse events and can plan for proper recognition and management due to the unique treatment required with this type of blood clot.”
Johnson & Johnson, in a statement to news outlets after the pause recommendation, said that “safety and well-being of people who use our products” is the company’s number one priority, adding it is aware of an “extremely rare disorder involving people with blood clots in combination with low platelets in a small number of individuals who have received our COVID-19 vaccine.”
The firm added that it is “reviewing these cases with European health authorities,” and it had “made the decision to proactively delay the rollout of our vaccine in Europe.”
The Epoch Times has contacted the CDC and FDA for comment.
