LONDON (REUTERS) - British regulators said they have identified 30 cases of rare blood clot events after the use of the AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine, 25 more than the agency previously reported.

The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency said on Thursday (April 1) that it had received no such reports of clotting events following use of the vaccine made by BioNTech and Pfizer.

The health officials, however, said they still believe that the benefits of the vaccine in the prevention of Covid-19 far outweigh any possible risk of blood clots.

Some countries are restricting use of the AstraZeneca vaccine while others have resumed inoculations, as investigations into reports of rare, and sometimes severe, blood clots continue.

On March 18, the UK medicines regulator said there had been five cases of a rare brain blood clot among 11 million administered shots.

On Thursday, it put the count at 22 reports of cerebral venous sinus thrombosis, an extremely rare brain clotting ailment, and eight reports of other clotting events associated with low blood platelets out of a total of 18.1 million doses given.