I have a friend who is anti mRNA vaccines as they are so new.
Are they?
The approved mRNA vaccines went through the same approval process as any vaccine. And once approved, they are monitored for safety like any other vaccine. Between pre-approval testing and post-approval monitoring, we would have detected any issues. So the proof is in the pudding — lots of countries have approved them and none have found risks that are worse than the disease they protect against (currently only COVID but there are more mRNA vaccines in the works).
There’s also no reason to fear the way they work. Other vaccines introduce antigens (molecules that your body doesn’t like and produces antibodies to attack) in various ways — sometimes with a weakend virus, sometimes with a dead virus, sometimes just the antigens themselves. mRNA is just another way to introduce antigens so your body learns to fight them. For a little while your body follows the instructions in the mRNA to produce the antigens, and then your body learns to attack those antigens. It’s not all that different from the way other vaccines work. mRNA breaks down pretty quickly in your body so it’s not even in your system for very long, and there’s no mechanism in the body for mRNA to produce lasting changes. So it’s a lot like you got a cold: for a little while the cold makes your body produce molecules, then your body fights it all off, and then in the end there’s no permanent change except your body learned to fight off that particular antigen.
Thanks, that’s what I thought. They always point to the recorded side effects and I always counter with the fact that the disease is a lot lot worse than the cure, and that it’s a classic trolley problem. If the equation is kill one to save a million, you always kill one.
Or am I missing something?
and that it’s a classic trolley problem
that’s not a trolley problem. The trolley problem is an ethics debate about whether it’s more ethical to allow multiple people die or take the action of saving that multiple people, condemning another to die instead. Not taking action, however, is itself an action- a choice- that is being made and the problem is entirely disconnected from real life…
The question of “vaccinate or not vaccinate” is an entirely different question. the question is, should you take an exceedingly small probability of manageable risks (allergic reactions, sore arms) to mitigate a rather high probability lethal risk (long term hospitalization, coma, death. death like symptoms.)
in the moderna vaccine, There’s a 10% chance your arm is going to have swelling/redness/soreness. 1.2% chance that the area effective is large enough to even really notice. and for the more severe risk of alergic reactions, that’s 2.5 cases per million doses, and is easily managed simply by maintaining the 15 minute observation after injection. (during which time staff are on hand to deal with the anaphylactic shock, which makes it substantially unlikely to cause permanent harm.)
the pfizer-biontech vaccine has similar mild reactions, that usually clear up in a single day, and a whopping 11 cases per million doses for allergic reactions (and 80% of those cases happened to people with an already diagnosed hypersensitivity to the PEG.)
this is compared to the probability of, you know, dying, from being unvaccinated. Per the CDC… yes, the vaccine is highly effective and extremely safe.
Also be a little wary of the ‘recorded side effects’. In the UK (and I’m sure its not alone), the NHS asked people to record any medical event that happened for a period post-vaccination that could conceivably be a side effect, in an abundance of caution - the idea that they could then sift the data for any actual side effects.
People often quote this raw data ‘look n people had heart attacks after vaccination’ - without factoring the expected number of heart attacks if that cohort had not been vaccinated. There’s some great stuff in the raw data like people who suffered twisted ankles. Reasonable to record, as say a statistically significant increase in twisted ankles could (say) suggest balance problems were a side effect (they aren’t)
Ah, a classic correlation is not causation situation. Thanks!
Not even that, more that the correlation might not be there in the first place.
In the US, this is often cited as “All-cause mortality”. Which means every tracked medication and procedure has a certain (extremely low) risk of car crashes, even in non-drivers.
Deaths were not mentioned at all.
They are not really all that new. The research for mRNA vaccines began over 50 years ago.
mRNA vaccines are among the safest vaccines ever made. There is nothing in an mRNA vaccine that can make you sick. What they are is instructions for your immune system on how to recognize certain viruses when it sees them. You can literally email the mRNA sequence to a different lab and, provided they have the right equipment, they can make the vaccine without ever needing a sample of the virus.
The mild symptoms some people get is the immune system activating and building the viral antigens specified by the mRNA vaccine, but there is no danger of getting Covid-19 or any other disease from the Covid-19 vaccine.
One side note: while I know you are using the medical definition of “mild symptoms”, please be aware that this doesn’t match the colloquial definition. You can be absolutely miserable for several days (and a number of people are) and still be considered mild. Unless you get into symptoms like difficulty breathing or hospitalization, it still counts as mild.
Fully agree with everything you wrote.
LOL, I was gonna say. Called in sick 2-days in a row after shot #2, and I work from home. Couldn’t even pretend to be working.
3D printable vaccines. mRNA is the 3D CAD file.
Something I found interesting is why it took 50 years (which is a detail anti-vaxxers never seem to know) for a usable result to reach the open market. There have been a ton of studies and trials trying to get a useful vaccine, but very little of it (historically) was successful. This wasn’t because of any health risks, but rather because they weren’t effective enough. The mRNA simply broke down too fast for your immune system to react.
If you are concerned about safety, you should be applauding mRNA over the older methods.
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mercury that crosses blood brain barrier is not amazing in general, even if it’s renamed to something else
Depends on the molecule. The ones used in vaccines are nit dangerous. See for example https://www.gov.scot/publications/foi-202100244467/
Is your friend stuck in 2021?
The covid vaccines are three years old now. Millions of people have had 3 or 4 shots, or even more.
In what world are they “new”.
Context: I’m fully vaccinated with 4 mRNA shots, I volunteered at a vaccination hub during the first lockdown.
It could be argued that they are still new in that we don’t know of any long term affects that might crop up in 20 years time.
Conversely of course any long term affects of a fukll-blown Covid infection that could crop up in 20 years time are likely to be considerably worse.
We’re getting Long Covid effects now, but I’ve yet to hear about Long Vax side effects.
Hypothetically, it could be because those folks have already died or are experiencing effects that genpop refuses to corroborate with the treatment. There’s been a major bias against reporting side effects (not that the process has ever been fully hashed out) and iirc the ‘cine industry is the only one you can’t sue, so any potentially-educational lawsuits that might’ve been are a nonstarter. Not saying these things are confirmed but that there’s definitely room for a lot to fly under the radar.
You can’t sue the makers because a federal agency has taken all liability. You can sue the agency though, and they do pay out occasionally for injuries caused by vaccines.
Some people have to go on blood thinners due to the covid shot. It’s rare, and most people should get their shot, but there are risks involved.
I work in a pharmacy and I’ve personally filled medications for about 5 people who said they are on blood thinners from getting a covid shot.
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Yes, you could argue that, but it would be an extraordinary claim.
I might still get indigestion from that taco I ate in 1999.
But it’s really unlikely, since that Taco cleared my system way back then.
mRNA also clears the body quite quickly.
So to have side-effects after so many years, one would need to explain a mechanism.
Otherwise it’s really just very speculative. Might as well believe 5G causes cancer. After all, it’s new technology.
Sure.
one would need to explain a mechanism.
Not really - one just needs to say ‘this a novel mechanism of producing an antigen, we don’t really know if there are any long-term affects’.
Very speculative and etraordinarily unlikely, I agree.
Besides that, mrna tech started to be developed in the 1970’s with the first labrat trials in the late 80’s or early 90’s.
Clinical trials on humans, to test their safety and effectiveness in combating various diseases and viruses have been ongoing for the past decade.
And as you said, the first several widely used vaccines based on mrna tech have been deployed to literally billions of people.
This is an incredibly gigantic sample size for data and there have been very few issues for the past 3 years.
And what bernieecclestoned brings up about herd immunity simply means the people they are talking to are, like most antivaxxers, blithering idiots that know some catch phrases and not a single meaning behind them.
You only obtain herd immunity with minimal casualties through hardening the herd with vaccines and then hope the immune systems of the herd adjust to further combat the disease. If data doesn’t show that new variants are easily countered by the immune systems of the herd, you know you need to develop more vaccines.
If you try to obtain herd immunity by letting a brand new disease like COVID run its course, you will probably obtain it eventually, but instead of 7 million dead worldwide (and lord knows how many with long covid or other long term disabilities due to the disease), you’ll have 70 million or more.
Herd immunity doesn’t mean you should just let shit hit the fan and see who’s left standing. If you miscalculate the severity of the disease, you can have another situation like with the plague where it killed over 25 million out of the 180 million people on earth.
In todays numbers that would mean like 1.1 billion people die. Probably far more since we’re extremely more connected than people were in 400AD.
And you’d think that the better general healthcare and hygiene these days would lessen it, but the sheer increase in how we’re connected would easily wipe that advantage off the board.
And the mRNA technology has been in progress for 50 years. That’s why it didn’t take long to create a COVID vaccine
Ok just going to make the counter argument if that’s ok?
They are new compared to traditional vaccines like polio and smallpox
Their view is that vaccines are now unnecessary because of herd immunity, (I’ve got them to concede that hospitals or the economy would have collapsed without vaccines), and that they are just being used up because govts signed contracts.
Their view is that the side effects risk is now higher than the benefit.
So how many years does it take to no longer be new?
The Polio vaccines are also new compared to the Smallpox vaccines.
But that doesn’t mean we don’t have sufficient data on their safety and effectiveness. And we have comparable levels of data on the mRNA covid vaccines.
So would you say that vaccines are still needed for all, or just for people like me who are immunosuppressed?
It’s basically the flu vaccine in my opinion.
People at risk stand to beneffit most, but it doesn’t need to be mandated .
Herd immunity only works if the herd is immune. If only a portion of the herd is immune, the rest of the herd will spread disease.
It requires a critical mass to work, and it protects those who can not get the vaccine for medical reasons (like allergic reactions, etc.)
It also only works if the herd remains immune. We are now seeing a return of diseases that had previously been eliminated (not eradicated), due to a decline in vaccinations. Examples include measles and whooping cough.
So would you say that vaccines are still needed for all, or just for people like me who are immunosuppressed?
Vaccines are needed for all, as in everyone who is eligible for inoculation. Yes, if I am vaccinated, my body will be much better equipped to successfully fight off the virus and keep me out of the hospital (and the morgue)…but in doing so, I also contribute to the overall herd immunity, which protects people who have pre-existing conditions, cannot be safely inoculated, or have immune system issues. If I don’t get vaccinated, I don’t just put myself at risk; if I get covid (which isn’t always obvious because it doesn’t always present physical symptoms, aka I could be a carrier), I also risk infecting everyone I come in contact with, which endangers people like you.
Anecdotal, I’ll admit, but I’ve had 6 shots now. And I plan on getting one every 6 months because I can’t take the risk of getting sick. The only side effects I’ve suffered is a sore arm for a day or so afterwards. The other side effect is that I haven’t gotten Covid yet, or if I did then it was so mild I didn’t notice most likely thanks to those vaccines.
Your friends are being short sighted. mRNA vaccines have been around for a long time, almost but not quite as long as polio or small pox vaccines, but still a long time. The only thing that changed for Covid, if you take the time to research the vaccine, is that the message protein was changed. This protein can’t hurt you or give you Covid in any way. All it does is present a foreign protein for your immune system to begin fighting. For most people, they don’t even notice. Mostly because our immune system is fighting off something actually infectious pretty much every day, but you don’t get sick. These vaccines are a valuable tool in fighting infections, specifically because of the way new updates to the vaccines can be created quickly. To deny this is being willfully blind to their benefits.
No. They are actually incredibly safe, much safer than the vaccines from last century. The big scandal from 1955, where an improperly killed polio vaccine gave polio to 40,000 kids, leaving 51 paralyzed and 5 dead, is literally impossible with mRNA vaccines.
As a doctor, I consider mRNA vaccines to be one of the most exciting developments in vaccine history. It has the potential to make vaccines something that a developer can encode, much like a programmer writing a computer program. The possible applications of this are insane.
Something tells me mRNA is irrelevant. It’s a common talking point among anti-vaxxers, and is typically nothing more than an excuse. It’s also a form of gish-galloping, where they pile a bunch of bullshit on you and make you defend it.
Ask them some follow-up questions like these. I suspect the trend will become clear.
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What are your thoughts on the more traditional non-mRNA covid vaccines, such as the ones from J&J or Novavax (or whatever you have in your area)?
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When was the last time you got any vaccine, including a flu shot?
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If you had the choice today, would you get the well-established vaccines such as polio or measles, mumps, rubella (MMR)?
Once you have these answers, you’ll know if they are truly concerned about mRNA being new or if it’s something else.
J&J might be a bad example as it’s a DNA vaccine.
Wait, DNA and not mRNA?
Yes. Pfizer and Moderna made mRNA vaccines. Johnson & Johnson and Oxford-AstraZeneca made DNA vaccines with an adenovirus vector. Novavax made a protein subunit vaccine.
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Why, are they OK with other vaccines?
Listening to an antivaxxer is a mistake - every time.
The risks of any specific vaccine must be judged against the risk of actually getting whatever disease. If the vaccines for whatever disease were as/more likely to fuck you up than the disease, then there wouldn’t be any point, and they wouldn’t get approved.
No on the contrary, mRNA is really brilliant, in my very limited understanding, instead of injecting you with a weakened disease, you get the learning process against it instead. This is actually a lot safer than other types of vaccine, and many times safer than getting the virus without having the vaccine.
I live in Denmark, and Denmark chose to use mRNA exclusively because they are both the safest and provide the best protection, Denmark is also one of the countries that have had fewest problems with COVID in the world, because we have very high rate of mRNA vaccinated people.
So you don’t have to experiment yourself, it’s already been done on a massive scale, and the result is clear.
Your friend is dumb. Get smarter friends. Sorry to be blunt, too many years dealing with ignorance celebrated as though it’s a desirable trait.
Unfortunately I’m at the age where more friends are dying than I’m making new ones lol
I see… in that case you probably can’t actually do anything except cut them out. Many if not most older people get stuck mentally in a very real physical way. They literally cannot change their minds.
I listened to a podcast 2 years ago that explained the history of covid/vaccines and where covid came from. I really wish I could remember what it was called but it was fantastic, I sent it to my family members who were anti-vax
Unless the friend has training as a microbiologist or something similar their belief is inconsequential. And even then they would be in the vast minority in their field (like a geologist that believes oil doesn’t come from the heat and compression of ancient organic matter).
A lot of people are afraid of new things they don’t understand. The hope is that people realize that the fear is irrational and listen to experts in the relevant field.
A lot of people are afraid of new things they don’t understand. The hope is that people realize that the fear is irrational and listen to experts in the relevant field.
That would be me, highly reluctant to try the new possibly risky thing until many other people have done it. But I DO realize my fear is (mostly) irrational, so after a bit I gather my courage and do the thing anyway. For covid mRNA vaccines, I skipped the first round, and watched the news carefully for word of people dropping dead. It didn’t happen, so I caught the second round of vaccines in my area about a month later. I was still afraid, but considered it my civic duty to reduce the spread to the greatest degree in my ability. And since then I’ve got every “booster” I was eligible for. As an old person, I’m eligible among the first, lol.
I’m not convinced there aren’t some under reported risks to the vaccine. But I still consider it my civic duty to help prevent the spread of something much riskier, covid.
Even if risks are under-reported (plausible, but unlikely, given the amount of scrutiny), it’s definitely the case that the risks from getting COVID are still not fully understood. Long COVID is a major issue that is still under investigation. So by your own metric - “highly reluctant to try the new possibly risky thing” - the vaccine is important. Because “the new possibly risky thing” in this case is getting COVID. You definitely don’t want to “try” that.
Good point about new risky thing lol! And I so firmly don’t want covid that, to my knowledge I haven’t had it. And I rather desperately don’t want long covid. THAT concern drives me more than simple covid. I’m cautious enough that people make fun of me, but too bad.
Your body creates and uses RNA all the time. If there was a problem it would show up nearly instantly. Anything else is something all vaccines do, so we can look to smallpox vaccines which are more than 200 years old for those effects. If there is anything else life itself wouldn’t be possible as RNA is critical to how life functions.
No. It’s too late in the game for your friend to be that stupid. Maybe find smarter friends.
The logical issue your friend is ignoring is that the disease (covid) is proven to be highly dangerous. The vaccine might be slightly dangerous (depending on who you believe). But clearly there are no remotely credible claims of hordes of people dropping dead of mRNA vaccines like there are for covid. So just from a lesser risk stand point, your friend should get the vaccine.
