The COVID-19 vaccines do not prevent individuals from catching or spreading COVID-19, and some claim they are linked to potentially fatal side effects, including myocarditis and blood clots. However, the experts now claim some adverse reactions may actually prove the vaccines are simply more effective than previously thought.
According to a recent study promoted by CNN, which supposedly found that mild symptoms – fever, chills or muscle pain – following vaccination can be linked to a stronger antibody response, meaning that experiencing COVID-19 vaccine side effects is actually a good thing.
“Having such symptoms after vaccination is associated with greater antibody responses compared with having only pain or rash at the injection site or no symptoms at all, suggests the paper published Friday in the journal JAMA Network Open,” CNN reported.
“In conclusion, these findings support reframing postvaccination symptoms as signals of vaccine effectiveness and reinforce guidelines for vaccine boosters in older adults,” the researchers stated in their paper.
Experts stress that while they believe COVID-19 vaccine side effects are a good sign, it does not mean the shots don’t work for those who didn’t experience them.
“I don’t want a patient to tell me that, ‘Golly, I didn’t get any reaction, my arm wasn’t sore, I didn’t have fever. The vaccine didn’t work.’ I don’t want that conclusion to be out there,” said Dr. William Schaffner, a professor in the Division of Infectious Diseases at Vanderbilt University Medical Center and medical director of the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases.
“This is more to reassure people who have had a reaction that that’s their immune system responding, actually in a rather good way, to the vaccine, even though it has caused them some discomfort,” Schaffner said.
“A lot of people have speculated over the years whether people who had more of a reaction to the vaccine might actually have that represent a more vigorous immune response,” Schaffner said. “And these data would appear to support that.”
While some experts suggest that COVID-19 vaccine side effects may benefit those who take the controversial shots, others have argued that the shots may be harmful for certain age groups.
Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo earlier this month officially recommended against receiving mRNA COVID-19 vaccines, particularly for males aged 18 to 39 due to an increased risk (84%) of cardiac-related death, Valiant News reported.
This news and commentary by Andrew White originally appeared on Valiant News.
