Over 99 million people who got the COVID-19 vaccine have been studied to see what effects it has had on their bodies since they got it.
Two new side effects of the COVID-19 vaccine have been found in people who got it: inflammation of the spinal cord and a neurological disease. In the biggest study ever done on vaccines, these results were found.
In 8 countries—Australia, Argentina, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, New Zealand, and Scotland—99 million people who had some form of the COVID-19 vaccine took part in the study. Concerns about vaccines are shown to be very difficult by this study. Researchers say that the benefits of the vaccine “vastly outweigh the risks,” even though there have been side effects.
As part of the Global Vaccine Data Network, researchers looked at electronic health records that showed 13 different brain, blood, and heart problems that people had after getting the COVID-19 vaccine from Pfizer, Moderna, or AstraZeneca.
There was a link between the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines and the side effects of pericarditis and myocarditis. Pericarditis is an inflammation of the heart skin, and myocarditis is an inflammation of the heart muscle. Some people also said they had side affects from Guillain-Barre Syndrome, a rare disorder in which the immune system attacks nerves.
So, two new side effects were found. The first was acute diffuse encephalomyelitis, which causes the brain and spinal cord to swell and become inflamed. This was also linked to the AstraZeneca vaccine.
Jim Buttery, co-director of the Global Vaccine Network, said that these results have made them look at another study of 6.8 million people in Argentina who got the AstraZeneca vaccine.
The data showed that these very uncommon disorders were very uncommon. Acute disseminated encephalomyelitis affected 0.78 out of every million people, and transverse myelitis affected 1.82 out of every million people. As Buttery put it, these kinds of side effects aren’t known about until millions of people get the vaccine.