How safe are the COVID vaccines?
I’ll bet you haven’t heard this: more congenital anomalies/birth defects and emergency room visits were reported after getting a COVID vaccine in the U.S. than after any of the other 93 vaccine types in the CDC’s VAERS database. And more deaths than 92 other vaccine types.
Here is how COVID vaccines rank among 94 vaccine types in terms of reported post-vaccine adverse effects.
- Congenital anomaly/birth defect: 1.
- Emergency room: 1.
- Death: 2.
- Life threatening: 5.
- “Serious” adverse effects: 7.
- Hospitalized: 10.
- Permanent disability: 12.
- Total adverse effects: 15.
Here, for example, is the screen shot of the CDC’s sorted list for the adverse effect of congenital anomaly/birth defect.
See that 144 such effects were reported in total, from all vaccines over all time tracked by the VAERS database. COVID vaccines account for 37 of them, or over 25%.
Of 23,950 emergency room visits following some kind of vaccination, the COVID vaccines accounted for 4,969, or over 20%. Of 11,559 deaths after getting some type of vaccine, COVID vaccines accounted for 1,153 of them, or almost 10%, and more than 92 of the 93 other vaccine types.
I got these numbers from the CDC’s VAERS database on March 10, 2021. You can do the same. The CDC has this disclaimer.
“VAERS accepts reports of adverse events and reactions that occur following vaccination. Healthcare providers, vaccine manufacturers, and the public can submit reports to VAERS. While very important in monitoring vaccine safety, VAERS reports alone cannot be used to determine if a vaccine caused or contributed to an adverse event or illness. The reports may contain information that is incomplete, inaccurate, coincidental, or unverifiable. Most reports to VAERS are voluntary, which means they are subject to biases. This creates specific limitations on how the data can be used scientifically. Data from VAERS reports should always be interpreted with these limitations in mind.”
So we can’t say the vaccines caused these effects. These effects just happened to follow shortly after the vaccines were given.
One thing to keep in mind with these numbers is that COVID vaccines have been around for less than three months. Most of the other 93 vaccine type have been in use for years. The Pfizer vaccine was authorized for emergency use on December 11, 2020, Moderna on Dec. 18, and Jannsen on February 27, 2021. And most doses were not given until late February. More than half the doses given to date (March 10) were given in the last month (since Feb. 10).
By the way, these are “emergency use authorizations” by the FDA. That is not what is usually meant by “FDA approved.”
Does the CDC warn us about side effects? Oh sure. Here is what you’ll find on the CDC’s “fact sheet” about the Pfizer vaccine, for example.
“The most commonly reported side effects, which typically lasted several days, were pain at the injection site, tiredness, headache, muscle pain, chills, joint pain, and fever. Of note, more people experienced these side effects after the second dose than after the first dose, so it is important for vaccination providers and recipients to expect that there may be some side effects after either dose, but even more so after the second dose.”
The CDC pulls a clever trick there. It reports only on the “most commonly reported side effects,” not the most serious ones. The milder side effects will almost always outnumber the more serious ones.
The CDC “fact sheet” mentioned nothing about the COVID vaccine type being the number-one leader in reported congenital anomalies/birth defects and emergency room visits. And nothing about having more reported deaths than all other vaccine types except one. You have to dig into the raw data to find these facts.
Just thought you might want to know this when someone tells you “it’s safe.”
A new lab study shows troubling signs that Pfizer's and Moderna's COVID-19 shots could be far less effective against the variant first found in South Africa
Pfizer's and Moderna's shots were at least 10 times less effective against variant in a new study.
Researchers tested the vaccines on a variant first found in South Africa, which is now in 20 states.
A mutation on the variant called E484K appeared to be a "major contributor," the study authors said.
COVID-19 vaccines from Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech appear significantly less effective against the coronavirus variant first found in South Africa, a lab study has suggested.
The percentage of protective antibodies that neutralized the variant - called B.1.351, which has been recorded in 20 US states - was 12.4 fold lower for Moderna's COVID-19 shot than against the original coronavirus, and 10.3 fold lower for Pfizer's, the study authors said.
This was a bigger drop than in previous lab studies testing the vaccines against manufactured forms of the variant, they said. For this study, the researchers used real forms of the variant taken from people who had caught the virus.
Both the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines have been authorized for emergency use in the US.
B.1.351 was first detected in South Africa in October 2020. It has since spread to 42 countries, including to the US, where it is circulating in at least 20 states, including California and Texas, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said. There are 81 reported cases of B.1.351 in the US overall, the CDC said.
The researchers found that the antibody activity from both vaccines was "essentially unchanged" against the variant first found in the UK, B.1.1.7. There are 3,037 reported cases in the US of B.1.1.7, the CDC said, and experts believe it will soon become the dominant strain in the US.
The scientists, from Columbia University, also tested lab-made viruses that had certain mutations. They said that one specific mutation, E484K, appeared to be a "major contributor" to the B.1.351 variant's ability to evade the antibody response. E484K is not usually present in B.1.1.7, the variant first found in the UK.
The study has been accepted by science journal Nature but not yet published.
Taking samples from the real world
In the experiment, scientists took 10 blood samples from people who had received two doses of Pfizer's vaccine, 28 days after their second dose, and 12 samples from those who had received two doses of Moderna's vaccine, 43 days after their second dose. They then compared how well antibodies in the blood samples "neutralized" the original coronavirus, compared to real-life B.1.1.7 and B.1.351 coronavirus variants.
The sample size was small, and the antibody response is just one aspect of the immune response, so it remains unclear how well the vaccines work against the variant first found in South Africa in real life.
Pfizer has conducted petri-dish tests before that showed a less potent antibody response against a lab-made coronavirus variant that mimicked the variant first found in South Africa. It was not the exact B.1.351 variant. The study, published as correspondence to the New England Journal of Medicine February 17 and updated March 8, suggested the vaccine would work against the variant. It also showed that the antibody response from Pfizer's shot held up against the variant first found in Brazil, P.1, that has a similar set of mutations to B.1.351.
Moderna ran similar tests and said that its vaccine held up well against the mutations found in B.1.1.7, the variant first found in the UK, but less well against the mutations found in B.1.351, the variant first identified in South Africa. Again, it used lab-made variants.
Both companies said in January that they were developing booster shots specifically to tackle the B.1.351 variant.
Neither of the vaccines has been properly tested against the variant first found in South Africa in the real world.
In Israel, Pfizer's vaccine has been shown to be highly effective against the B.1.1.7 variant, first found in the UK. About 80% of Israelis with COVID-19 are infected with B.1.1.7.
The COVID-19 vaccine from Johnson & Johnson was less effective in the clinical trials that took place in South Africa.
Read the original article on Business Insider
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