Self-reported side effects of the Oxford AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine among healthcare workers in Ethiopia, Africa

Introduction: Ethiopia is the second most populous country in Africa. Ethiopia received most of its COVID-19 vaccines through donations. The Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine is the first to be donated to Ethiopia by the COVAX facility. Healthcare workers were the priority population that received the Oxford AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine. However, there was no nationwide study on the safety of the vaccine in Ethiopia. This study aimed to measure the prevalence and predictors of self-reported side effects of the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine. Materials and methods: telephone interview. Descriptive and inferential analyses were done. The software, IBM SPSS Statistics v21.0, was used for analyses of data. Results: Out of 384 people, 346 responded (response rate: 90.1%). Female accounted for 34.1% of the respondents. The mean age of the respondents was 31.0 years (Standard Deviation (SD) = 7.4). Nurses accounted for 43.7% of the respondents. The prevalence of at least one local- and systemic-side effect was 50.6 and 44.5%, respectively. The most frequent local- and systemic- side effect were injection site pain and headache, respectively. Both types of side effects mostly subsided in the first 3 days. A third of healthcare workers with side effects took at least one medication. Paracetamol followed by diclofenac sodium were taken by healthcare workers to overcome side effects. There was no independent predictor of local side effect. After controlling for age and chronic diseases, the odds of healthcare workers with COVID-19 like symptoms to experience systemic side effects was 1.38 (Confidence Interval (CI): 1.04-1.82) times more than that of healthcare workers without COVID-19 like symptoms. Conclusions: The prevalence of local- and systemic-side effects of the Oxford AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine was modest. As the symptoms were mostly common in the first 3 days, it is preferable to monitor healthcare workers at least in the first 3 days following the administration of the vaccine

2019-20 coronavirus outbreak · Cross-sectional study · Disease · Health care · Outbreak · Political science · Intramuscular injections and effects · Long-Term Effects of COVID-19 · Medicine · SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19 Research · Internal Medicine · Virology

• Understanding the Covid-19 vaccine uptake, acceptance, and hesitancy in Ethiopia and Tanzania

  Open Access•Esayas Kebede Gudina, Florida Muro et al.•Frontiers in Public Health•2024

  Incluir item

• Interventions to mitigate early spread of Sars-CoV-2 in Singapore

  Open Access•Joel Ruihan Koo, Alex R Cook et al.•The Lancet Infectious Diseases•2020

  Incluir item

• Safety and efficacy of the ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 vaccine (AZD1222) against Sars-CoV-2

  Open Access•Merryn Voysey, Sue Ann Costa Clemens et al.•The Lancet•2021

  Incluir item

• The Strengthening the Reporting of Observational Studies in Epidemiology (STROBE) Statement

  Open Access•Erik Von Elm, David G Altman et al.•PLoS Medicine•2007

  Incluir item

• High Rates of Covid-19 Vaccine Hesitancy and Its Association with Conspiracy Beliefs

  Open Access•Malik Sallam, Deema Dababseh et al.•Vaccines•2021

  Incluir item

• Covid-19 vaccine acceptance and hesitancy in low- and middle-income countries

  Open Access•Julio S Solís Arce, Shana S Warren et al.•Nature Medicine•2021

  Incluir item

• Covid-19 Vaccines Safety Tracking (CoVaST)

  Open Access•Abanoub Riad, Holger J Schünemann et al.•International Journal of…•2021

  Incluir item