Canadians Can Have Confidence In Health System After WHO Decries Vaccine Mixing - Minister

WASHINGTON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 12th July, 2021) Canadians can have confidence in the country's health officials, which had approved the mixing of coronavirus vaccines, Minister of International Development Karina Gould said on Monday in response to a top World Health organization (WHO) scientist dismissing the practice.

"We always need to ask questions of Health Canada and NACI [National Advisory Committee on Immunizations] NACI, who are the ones making these recommendations, but I think we can all have a lot of confidence they are doing it with our best interests and with the health and safety of Canadians top of mind," Gould said during a press briefing.

Earlier on Monday, WHO Chief Scientist Soumya Swaminathan said that mixing different coronavirus vaccines is a "dangerous trend" and could lead to chaos, contradicting NACI's advice.

Last month, NACI advised that those Canadians who have received the AstraZeneca shot as the first dose in their vaccination schedule may get vaccinated with a messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccine for their second dose, noting that it considers the two mRNA vaccines currently approved for use in Canada - produced by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna - interchangeable.