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* Recommends use for those only aged under 65
* Decision makes AZ's vaccine third shot available in the
country
(Adds quote, details)
By Sudip Kar-Gupta and Geert De Clercq
PARIS, Feb 2 (Reuters) - France's top health advisory body
on Tuesday approved the use of AstraZeneca's COVID-19
vaccine, but said the shot should only be administered to those
aged under 65.
The Haute Autorite de la Sante (HAS) said people aged 50 to
65 with health issues and medical staff should get priority
access.
The decision makes AstraZeneca's vaccine the third shot
available in France, after those of Pfizer/BioNTech
and Moderna.
Its recommended use for those aged below 65 echoes similar
advice from experts in Italy, Austria, and Germany, which said
the vaccine should not be given to the elderly, citing a lack of
sufficient data to recommend use in older age groups.
"There is still insufficient data for those aged 65+. We
hope to have them in the coming weeks," the head of the HAS,
Dominique Le Guludec, told reporters.
"The vaccine's performance is satisfactory with a 62%-70%
efficacy depending on various study outcomes", she added.
The European Medicines Agency (EMA) gave the green light to
the AstraZeneca vaccine four days ago, saying there was not yet
enough results for people over the age of 55 to determine how
well the vaccine worked in that group but that it could still be
given to older people.
The approval is expected to ease pressure on the French
government, whose vaccination rollout strategy has been heavily
criticized for being too slow.
As of Feb. 1, more than 1.6 million doses had been
administered in France. That compares with an estimate of nearly
10 million in Britain.
But the European Union, which last year agreed to buy up to
400 million doses of the vaccine for the bloc, is at the centre
of a dispute with AstraZeneca over the speed of supplies.
Last week, the company unexpectedly announced cuts of up to
60% in supplies to European countries, citing production
problems at a Belgian factory and triggering a furious response
from Brussels.
The HAS said it expected France to get 10 million doses of
the AstraZeneca vaccine in the next three months, which would
allow 5 million people to get vaccinated, given its two-dose
regimen.
In the same timeframe, France hopes to secure 19.3 million
shots from Pfizer/BioNTech and 3 million from Moderna.
French European Affairs Minister Clement Beaune said on
Monday he expected first doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine to
arrive by next week at the latest.
(Reporting by Sudip Kar-Gupta, Geert De Clercq; Writing by
Matthias Blamont; Editing by Bernadette Baum and Rosalba
O'Brien)
