Georgia is suspending use of doses of Johnson & Johnson at a state vaccination site after several people had adverse reactions to the shooting.

“Out of caution,” the Georgia Department of Health and the North Health District have stopped use of the J&J vaccine at the Cummings Fairground site, located about 63 km north of downtown Atlanta.

While use of the J&J vaccine is not being halted at other sites in Georgia, the hiatus interrupts a vaccine rollout which is among the slowest in the country.

Of the 425 people who received doses of J&J on Wednesday at the site, eight had adverse reactions, the Georgia Department of Health said in an emailed statement to the Financial Times. One person was assessed in a hospital, while the others were monitored at the fair site and sent home.

The health department said that “the reactions were consistent with reactions common in vaccinated adults, with any vaccine, but due to the number of people affected, the site has stopped J&J vaccinations to assess.”

Tens of thousands of doses of J&J “have been administered statewide without adverse effects,” the Georgia Department of Health said. Use of J & J’s single-shot vaccine is not disrupted at other sites in the state, which ranks eighth in the United States in terms of population.

“There is no reason to believe that there is anything wrong with the vaccine itself, and other people who have received the vaccine should not be concerned,” said Dr Kathleen Toomey. , health commissioner.

The United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is evaluating incidents in Georgia alongside other incidents in Colorado, Iowa and North Carolina, the Department of Health said. Toomey said state authorities “were examining what had happened and what could have caused the reactions, including conditions at the fairground such as the heat and the ability to keep the site cool.”

Three sites in North Carolina were allowed to resume J&J vaccinations after the CDC said Friday it found no evidence of safety concerns.

Georgia has fully vaccinated 14.5% of its 10.6 million people, according to data released Thursday morning by the CDC. That ranks it last in the United States on this measure and compares to the all-state average of 20.8 percent. The state administered at least one dose of the vaccine to 28.1% of all residents, which ranks third in the United States.

New infections have been on the decline since peaking in early January. Georgia has averaged nearly 13 new cases per day over the past week, according to the CDC, up from a rate of more than 90 per day at the start of the year. The downward trend contributed to Gov. Brian Kemp’s decision this week to proclaim “Georgia is open for business” and lift all pandemic era restrictions from April 8.

Georgia has confirmed 1,022 cases of the B.1.1.7 coronavirus variant, according to the CDC. This is the sixth-highest workload for the strain, which was first identified in the UK late last year, behind Florida (its neighbor to the south), Michigan , Minnesota, Massachusetts and Utah.