#DeBlasio #HateCrime #Vaccine #Johnson #NYC

An Asian man has been violently attacked in broad daylight in New York as the city continues to struggle with soaring rates of violent crime.

Just hours after the horrific attack, 'soft-on-crime' Mayor Bill de Blasio was seen rubbing elbows with Hamilton creator Lin-Manuel Miranda in nearby Times Square.

The ugly incident occurred Monday afternoon on the Upper East Side, with the assailant allegedly targeting the man at random before body slamming him into the glass window of a store.

The store surveillance camera captured that shocking moment, and shows the attacker subsequently trying to flee before he was stopped by a Good Samaritan.

The assailant also allegedly sucker-punched the Asian victim, although that incident was not captured on the camera.

According to ABC 7, the attacker had been yelling at random pedestrian 'Don't look at me!' before he suddenly targeted and followed the Asian man.

Afterward, the man was seen yelling at the Good Samaritan who stopped him, saying: 'I'm gonna kill somebody! Get out of my face!'

Police arrived at the scene, but not before the offender had left on foot. As of Tuesday afternoon, he is still at large.

The NYPD told The New York Post that the attacker did not make any anti-Asian slurs, so the the incident has not been logged as a hate crime.

However, one eyewitness told ABC that the offender - who is black - was 'yelling about Chinese, Spanish and white people'.

Hate crimes are up 28.1 percent this year, while violent crime is also on the rise.

The Mayor appeared to be in high spirits and he hobnobbed with A-list celebrity Miranda as they opened a new vaccination center for Broadway workers in the area.

'We want to gather again, and we want to tell stories in the dark,' Miranda stated at a press conference to celebrate the center.

'We cannot do that if we don't feel safe and if you don't feel safe. So the first step in that process is getting our vaccination shots, and the next steps will follow.'

De Blasio also took to the podium to profess his love of Broadway.

------------------------

Virginia is stopping using Johnson & Johnson's COVID vaccine after a 45-year-old woman died following her vaccination in March.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is investigating the woman's death, Virginian health authorities announced on Tuesday.

The CDC's Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) system notes the woman who died began having headaches six days following vaccination, then was hospitalized once the headache worsened and she had started dry heaving.

A head CT scan showed hemorrhaging expanding up to 1.6 centimeters and eventually, cortical vein thrombosis, as listed in the six other cases.

She died on March 18, Richmond.com reported - 12 days after receiving a dose administered by a school.

VAERS does not list any known allergies or underlying medical conditions other than depression.

News of her death, and Virginia's decision to stop using the J&J vaccine, came on the day the CDC and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) advised a pause in the use of the company's jabs.

Their recommendation was made after six patients, out of the 6.8 million to receive the jab so far, reported blood clots.

J&J announced that they were also delaying the rollout of their vaccine in Europe, and pausing clinical trials.

The patients were all women aged 18-48, who suffered a cerebral venous sinus thrombosis (CVST) six to 13 days after receiving the jab.

It is still too early to tell whether or not the vaccine even caused the blood clots and it is a one in a million side effect.

Five times as many people have died from COVID-19 in the U.S. as they do from blood clots ever year.

The agencies, however, say they want to do more tests and studies and that it could take days for them decide on whether or not to resume it.

They may impose a restriction on the vaccine based on the demographic of people who have developed blood clots - all of them are women under 50.

The White House on Tuesday tried to smooth over the sudden halt of the Johnson and Johnson COVID-19 vaccine, claiming it would not affect their goals to vaccinate the U.S. - despite health experts saying it clearly sets back the country's rollout.

President Joe Biden said in the Oval Office on Tuesday: 'I made sure we have 600 million doses of the mRNA - not of either Johnson & Johnson or AstraZeneca.

'So, there is enough vaccine that is basically 100 per cent unquestionable for every single solitary American,' he said.

Now, everyone who had a J&J appointment has been told they'll get one of the other doses instead - which suddenly eats into the country's stock pile of each, and sets future appointments back even further.