Last checked at 
By Kate Kelland
LONDON, March 22 (Reuters) - Confidence in the safety of
AstraZeneca's COVID-19 vaccine has taken a big hit in Spain,
Germany, France and Italy as reports of rare blood clots have
been linked to it and many countries briefly stopped using it,
poll data showed on Monday.
The polling firm YouGov said it had already found in late
February that Europeans were more hesitant about the AstraZeneca
vaccine than about those from Pfizer Inc
/BioNTech and Moderna Inc, and that
the clot concerns had further damaged public perceptions of the
AstraZeneca shot's safety.
At least 13 European countries in the past two weeks stopped
administering the AstraZeneca shot, co-developed with scientists
at Oxford University, after reports of a small number of blood
disorders.
Many resumed its use on Friday after the European Medicines
Agency regulator said in a preliminary safety review on Thursday
that the vaccine was safe and effective and not linked with a
rise in the overall risk of blood clots.
EMA did not rule out a possible link, however, with rare
cases of blood clots in the brain known as cerebral venous sinus
thrombosis (CVST).
YouGov's poll - which covered about 8,000 people in seven
European countries between March 12 and 18 - found that in
France, Germany, Spain and Italy, people were now more likely to
see the AstraZeneca vaccine as unsafe than as safe.
Some 55% of Germans say it is unsafe, while less than a
third think it is safe, the poll showed. In France, where
AstraZeneca's COVID vaccine was already unpopular, 61% of people
polled say they now see it as unsafe.
In Italy and Spain, most people previously felt the
AstraZeneca vaccine was safe - at 54% and 59% respectively - but
those rates have fallen to 36% and 38% respectively, in the
latest poll.
The survey showed that only in Britain, where the
AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine has been used in a national rollout
since January, have the blood clot concerns had little to no
impact on public confidence. The majority of people polled in
the UK - 77% - still say the shot is safe. Their trust in it is
on a par with Pfizer's 79% perceived safety rating.
YouGov also said there appeared to be no spillover concerns
across the seven European countries polled for the Pfizer and
Moderna COVID-19 vaccines, both of which were seen as being as
safe as in a poll three weeks ago.
(Reporting by Kate Kelland; Editing by Peter Cooney)
