COVID-19 Vaccines: Facial Paralysis / CDC J&J Guidance

By Amy Orciari Herman

Edited by David G. Fairchild, MD, MPH, and Lorenzo Di Francesco, MD, FACP, FHM

Check out some of today's COVID-19 vaccine news:

Facial paralysis: The COVID-19 mRNA vaccines do not appear to pose any higher risk for facial paralysis than other viral vaccines, according to an analysis in JAMA Internal Medicine. Of nearly 135,000 adverse drug reactions linked to the mRNA vaccines reported to the World Health Organization's pharmacovigilance database, 0.6% were facial paralysis-related events (e.g., paralysis, paresis, spasms). The majority of these were linked to the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, and the median time to onset was 2 days. For comparison, facial paralysis events accounted for 0.5% of adverse reactions to other viral vaccines and 0.7% of reactions to influenza vaccines. The authors conclude that "if an association between facial paralysis and mRNA COVID-19 vaccines exists, the risk is likely very low, as with other viral vaccines."

CDC J&J Guidance: The CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices has published its updated recommendations on the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine in MMWR. The recommendations, first announced late last week, reaffirm that the vaccine's benefits outweigh its risks and now include a warning on the risk for thrombosis with thrombocytopenia after vaccination, particularly among females aged 18 to 49. The warning now appears in the vaccine's emergency use authorization fact sheet (linked below), which should be provided to any potential vaccine recipient.