What Allergic Vaccine Reactions Mean For You

be working. The country has inoculated about of its population, and it is starting to see signs that the swift campaign is slowing the virus. A study from the Sheba Medical Center of around five hundred healthcare workers who got the Fighter shot showed more than fifty produced antibodies after the first week. The findings are preliminary, but they're encouraging. In New York City, residents looking to get vaccines have to navigate a bewildering system that's hindering plans to speed

up inoculations. According to a tweet from Comptroller Scott Stringer, who is also a mayoral candidate, to ramp up its slow rollout. The city opened mass vaccination sites on Sunday in Brooklyn, and the Bronx extended shots on Monday to people seventy five and over and encouraged everyone eligible to schedule an appointment, but the sign up process is fractured and confusing. Meanwhile, the city's mayor, build A. Blasio reaffirmed his goal of dolling out one million COVID nineteen doses

by the end of January. Finally, Faser and bio Ntech raised their COVID nineteen vaccine production target for this year to two billion shots. The partners have already agreed to deliver more than half that capacity. Bio Ntech said in a presentation on Monday, a new production site in Marburg, Germany will be able to make as many as seven hundred and fifty million doses per year. And now for

today's main story. As vaccinations roll out across the country, a few people have incurred serious allergic reactions, despite that the CDC is sticking with its recommendation that most people should still get the shots. I spoke with healthcare reporter and a court about why. Almost as soon as people began to receive shots of COVID nineteen vaccines. We heard reports of allergic reactions and I was just hoping you might tell us a little bit about the kinds of

reactions people were experiencing with regard to the COVID nineteen vaccine. Right, So we know that there are in general with vaccines reactions people can have to getting shots, and and many of them are are mild and they go away. You know, I think we've all had that sort of injection site paying your arm feels a little sore, it goes away. Um. You can have other things like fever, headache again, things that are very short lived, Um, typically kind of disappear.

So what we're talking about here is a little bit different. The main kind of safety concern is these year allergic reactions known as anaphylaxis, which you know, can be life threatening. Those it's rare that people die of it. And specifically, we're getting a clearer picture now from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention of how frequently this occurs, and the answer is very infrequently. It's the CDC says it's had about twenty nine confirmed cases of anaphylaxis to

these COVID nineteen shots so far. These are both to the Fiser shot as well as the Maderna shot. But the rate at which this is happening, you know, twenty nine of the millions of people who have been vaccinated is is still quite low. So it's the rate is about one in one thousand people. It's important to note like these are severe reactions. People went to the hospital, you know, they were some of them were treating the

emergency room. Some were actually hospitalized or taken to the i c U. But ultimately we haven't had any death from these reactions, the CDC is saying, So that's positive news. The big takeaway here is that although there are risks to getting COVID shots, like to any medical product, to any drug, to any vaccine, ultimately the CDC. CDC is

still urging most people to get the shots. And the two exceptions they've outlined are people who know that they are allergic to vaccine ingredients and people who had a reaction to that first dose of the covid vaccine should not get the second dose. And as far as you know, were we now have a variety of different vaccine shots. We have as you mentioned Fiser, we have moderna UM. You know, there's the Astra Zeneca and the University of

Oxford vaccine as well. And you know, when we're talking about potential allergic reactions, is there any difference between these various shots as far as potential allergies to ingredients or something along those lines that would depend on what shot someone is getting. That is a really good question and I think we would all love to know the answer

to that. Something that's coming up now in terms of the allergic reactions to these early COVID nineteen shots is really health officials trying to understand more about why this is happening and and specifically the rate we're seeing, which is, you know, somewhat higher than the rate of anaphylaxis scene with flu vaccines. They're trying to make sense of why

that could be. Isn't something specific to this m R and a technology which both the MADERNA and fisor vaccines um use, or could it just be something else else going on? Another factor here is that this is a vaccine rollout that's being really closely monitored right then with good reason um. And that means that it's possible we're and hopeful that we're picking up on more of these cases than we normally do because there's so much scrutinay

being paid to that safety profile here. So it's something where we a you know, be learning more as these shots are rolled out and as more become available. As you said, there have been fairly few reports of severe allergic reactions to the say either Fiser or modern as vaccines, But have those reports of reactions altered any plans for distribution or the rollout in any way? What we are hearing from the CDC is that it hasn't significantly changed

plans for distribution. It hasn't even really significantly changed their recommendations in terms of who should get the vaccine. What they are saying again is, you know, providers need to be prepared to treat these kinds of reactions. So something they've been saying this whole time is as people get these shots, they should be monitored I think for up to thirty minutes after receiving the shots, because that's when

it's most likely that these reactions will emerge. And then that providers should be familiar with and have on hand these treatments like the EpiPen, these allergic reaction treatments so that they can do something if someone has one of these severe reactions, so they're prepared to treat patients. You know, you mentioned the flu and the flu shot. I mean, thus far do the numbers of people who have experienced

an allergic reaction to either Fiser or Maderna's vaccine. How does that compare to the people who experienced, say, an

allergic reaction to the annual flu shot. So so the latest information we have about this comes by way of the CDC, which put out a report um that was focused specifically on the Fiser vaccine because the Fiser vaccine was the first to get authorized in the US and it had the most uptake when the CDC was compiling this information, so recipients of the Fiser vaccine there was a rate of eleven point one per million doses administered, so eleven point one cases of anaphyl access per million

doses administered. And then when you talk about the flu vaccine, the rates actually lower. Based on the studies we have, it's about one point three times per million doses of flu vaccine. So again eleven point one compared to one point three times per million doses. The rate appears to be higher with these COVID nineteen vaccines, but it's important to note and something the CDC said during a briefing the other day was, we have seen in some small

studies that other vaccines have higher rates of anaphylaxis. So twelve to twenty five times per million doses, it's within the range of what's expected here. Again the CDC saying it's still quite rare that this is going to happen with this vaccine at this point, based on what we the information we have, and that it's still important to get these vaccines because you have to stack it up against the risk of getting a severe case of COVID nineteen,

which has obviously very significant consequences for patients. So in terms of populations who would be at risk for a severe allergic reaction, who would fall into that category. Yeah, so this is the key part of this, right um, And we don't have a perfect information, but what we did hear from the CDC recently was of these twenty one cases of severe allergic reactions with the Fiser shot, seventeen had a documented history of allergies and seven had

a history of anaphylaxis. And by the way, allergies is that's pretty wide ranging, right, that's allergies to drugs, right, that's allergic reactions to food, to insects things. So, um, this is a lot a lot of people who who might be kind of starting to think about this and wonder what it means for them getting the shots. And what the CDC is saying is talk this over with

your physician and make this decision. It's not something that I think every person is educated about as they experienced medical care, as they go to the doctor, as they

venture out in the world. But it's something that's really important to know because you know, there's always a risk you're taking on and that doesn't mean you shouldn't get care or you shouldn't get a shot, for instance, but it is something that it's helpful to be educated about so you're properly informed us you go into any situation. That was Emma Court. And that's it for our show today.

For coverage of the outbreak from one and twenty bureaus around the world, visit Bloomberg dot com slash coronavirus and if you like the show, please leave us a review and a rating on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. It's the best way to help more listeners find our global reporting The Prognosis Daily edition is produced by Tophra Foreheads, Magnus Hendrickson and me Laura Carlson. Today's main story was reported by Emma Court, original music by Leo Sidrin. Our editors

are Rick Shine and Francesco Levi. Francesco Levi is blue Berg's head of podcasts. Thanks for listening, h