Health Canada extends expiry date for thousands of AstraZeneca-Oxford doses – CBC
Thousands of doses will now expire on July 1 instead of Monday
May 29, 2021
Ontario received permission from Health Canada to extend the expiry of some doses of the AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine on Saturday, saving thousands of shots from potentially going to waste.
A spokesperson for Health Minister Christine Elliott said the change means doses with an original expiry of May 31 can now be used until July 1.
“Health Canada has issued an authorization to extend the expiry date of specific lots of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine from six months to seven months, following the review of submitted stability data,” Alexandra Hilkene said in a statement.
Pharmacies and physicians offices in the province had been rushing to administer thousands of shots this weekend ahead of their previous Monday expiry date to avoid wasting doses.
Ontario had been trying to redistribute a stockpile of 45,000 shots expiring on May 31 and 10,000 more going bad in June.
Read more: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/astrazeneca-covid19-vaccine-expiry-date-1.6045685
