We have seen that COVID-19 vaccination saves lives, especially among older adults. "MIT Scientist Warns Parents NOT TO GIVE CHILDREN Vaccine, Could Cause Crippling Neurodegenerative Disease In Young People," reads the headline of a Jan. 18 article from the Geller Report, a website run by Pamela Geller. There is no evidence the shots cause neurodegenerative diseases. Does Classen provide any empirical evidence to support this rigorous-sounding conclusion that mRNA vaccines induce the folding of these proteins? It was published in a journal widely viewed to be predatory, which means it likely went through little to no peer review. The latter theory was inspired, he said in that allegedly peer-reviewed journal, by the arrest of Jeffery Epstein. The most significant findings suggest the disease may potentially . In lieu of evidence to support this claim, Classen asserts that "the vaccine RNA was analyzed for the presence of sequences that can activate TDP-43 and FUS." These allegations are. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, updated Jan. 25. Margaret Fahnestock, a professor in the Department of Psychiatry & Behavioural Neurosciences at McMaster University, agreed. As USA TODAY has previously reported, reports in VAERS are not proof of side effects caused by the COVID-19 vaccines. This claim has also been fact-checked by USA Today, The Dispatch and in French by AFP Factuel. The journal is not indexed in PubMed.gov, a US database containing more than 32 million citations and abstracts under the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the agency for medical research. Efficacy was generally consistent across age, gender, race and ethnicity demographics, and across participants with a variety of underlying conditions. The claim: Children shouldn't receive the COVID-19 vaccine because it could cause neurodegenerative disease. The activisthas previously shared false and misleading claims on social media. Most were Pfizers and Modernas mRNA vaccines, though shots that use different technology are also available in the United States from Johnson & Johnson and in Canada from AstraZeneca. Neurodegenerative diseases, including conditions like Parkinson's and Alzheimer's, occur when nerve cells in the brain or nervous system slowly stop working and die, according to the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. Such publishers profit from publication fees with little regard for enacting meaningful peer-review. (The latter shot is not authorized in the U.S.). You cansubscribe to our print edition, ad-free app or electronic newspaper replica here. The report states that of the billions of vaccines shipped worldwide between December 1, 2020, and February 28, 2021, there were 42,086 reported reactions. Shortly after its initial outbreak in the Wuhan city of China, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) and its associated disease, Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19), have led to a global pandemic with major socio-economic impact and millions of confirmed deaths (1, 2).Unprecedented mass immunization campaigns have been initiated worldwide in an attempt to . More generally, diseases involving misfolded PrPs have consistently been found to involve an initial early phase of prion replication in the spleen which happens long before overt symptoms appear [22, 23]. This press release contains forward-looking statements of BioNTech within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Please see Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) Fact Sheet for Healthcare Providers Administering Vaccine (Vaccination Providers) including Full EUA Prescribing Information available at www.cvdvaccine.com. ", "Prion diseases occur when normal prion protein, found on the surface of many cells, becomes abnormal and clump in the brain, causing brain damage," the Hopkins Medicine page explains. +49 (0)6131 9084 1513[emailprotected], Investor Relations Cases of myocarditis and pericarditis have rarely been observed following receipt of COVID-19 vaccines used in the United States. She received the second dose on April 25. In this conversation. For rare disease patients and their loved ones, better treatment options cannot come soon enough. Several studiesfound no link between immunizations and a heightened risk of diabetes. The Pfizer coronavirus vaccine has been linked to an increased chance of developing thrombotic thrombocytopenic purpura (TTP), a rare blood disorder, Israeli researchers said Monday. National File promoted Classen's study with the headline, "Pfizer Vaccine Confirmed To Cause Neurodegenerative Diseases." According to researchers' report on bioRxiv.org, the omicron variant's high "environmental stability" might have helped it spread so rapidly. Unleashing the next wave of scientific innovations, Research and Business Development Partnerships, https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210401005365/en/, https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMc2102017, Understanding Six Types of Vaccine Technologies, Do not administer Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine to individuals with known history of a severe allergic reaction (e.g., anaphylaxis) to any component of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine, Appropriate medical treatment used to manage immediate allergic reactions must be immediately available in the event an acute anaphylactic reaction occurs following administration of Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine, Monitor Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine recipients for the occurrence of immediate adverse reactions according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines (, Immunocompromised persons, including individuals receiving immunosuppressant therapy, may have a diminished immune response to the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine, The Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine may not protect all vaccine recipients, In clinical studies, adverse reactions in participants 16 years of age and older included pain at the injection site (84.1%), fatigue (62.9%), headache (55.1%), muscle pain (38.3%), chills (31.9%), joint pain (23.6%), fever (14.2%), injection site swelling (10.5%), injection site redness (9.5%), nausea (1.1%), malaise (0.5%), and lymphadenopathy (0.3%), Severe allergic reactions, including anaphylaxis, have been reported following the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine during mass vaccination outside of clinical trials. These included those who had fully recovered or are recovering from COVID, those who recovered but were still experiencing some symptoms, those not recovered at the time of the report, and the 1,223 who are listed as "fatal.". Fact check: French rugby player Jordan Michallet died by suicide, not COVID-19 vaccine, "I got to the second sentence of the abstract which reads: 'The utilization of mRNA vaccines in the context of infectious disease had no precedent, but desperate times seemed to call for desperate measures,'" Salmon said. T he Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Sunday said people who have experienced severe reactions to prior vaccines or injectable drugs can still get the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine for . You can subscribe to our print edition, ad-free app or electronic newspaper replica here. "You would think they would be the first to be affected if this statement was true.". Jerica Pitts Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, accessed Feb. 2. While the report discussed adverse reactions to the vaccine in a 90-day period and the figures are genuine, the pharmaceutical company has said the documents do not link the vaccine as being responsible for the people's death. Prion diseases consist of a family of rare neurodegenerative disorders caused by proteins that have folded abnormally, also known as prion proteins, which triggernormal proteins they come into contact with to also misfold. April 18, 2023: FDA authorizes changes to simplify use of bivalent mRNA COVID-19 vaccines. We reviewed the most promising COVID-2 vaccines with a particular . The CDC has not, however . Bottom line. Articles claim a study found that the Covid-19 vaccine developed by Pfizer-BioNTech may cause diseases such as Alzheimer's. But medical experts say the study linking mRNA shots to. Vaccine safety has now been evaluated in more than 44,000 participants aged 16 years and older with more than 12,000 vaccinated participants having at least six months of follow-up after their second dose. Based on its deep expertise in mRNA vaccine development and in-house manufacturing capabilities, BioNTech and its collaborators are developing multiple mRNA vaccine candidates for a range of infectious diseases alongside its diverse oncology pipeline. Alex Kasprak is an investigative journalist and science writer reporting on scientific misinformation, online fraud, and financial crime. According to the Center for Disease Control, prion diseases are "a family of rare progressive neurodegenerative disorders that affect both humans and animals. For some of the purported sequences Classen claims to identify, he even admits he needs "more sophisticated computers" to verify them as accurate. Contrary to Classen's claim, there is no evidence to suggest the COVID-19 vaccines can cause prion diseases or other neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer's. People ages 6 years and up. The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely. Read more at straitstimes.com. 1. Omicron study: Longest living variant on skin and plastic. "The link does not look like any sort of peer-reviewed paper,"Daniel Salmon,director of the Institute for Vaccine Safety at Johns Hopkins University, said in an email. People with dementia may find it difficult to wash their hands regularly and wear a mask. The vaccine is safe for those living with Alzheimer's and other dementia. All rights reserved. This point becomes important when we consider whether the COVID-19 vaccines might cause prion diseases. "The current RNA based SARSCoV-2 vaccines were approved in the US using an emergency order without extensive long term safety testing," the report declares. As such the claim that scientists have "confirmed" that the Pfizer vaccine causes neurological damage from prion diseases is "False.". "In this paper the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine was evaluated for the potential to induce prion-based disease in vaccine recipients." Prion diseases comprise several conditions. Rare neurological conditions may occur after Covid vaccination, but the risk is far higher in people who catch Covid, new research suggests. The site is secure. Some of them include: 3. The 1,223 fatalities listed in the report are among 158,893 adverse effects reports from health officials from across the world. Hence the claims on social media are completely wrong as they are based on a flawed study from which no conclusions can be made," Racaniello stated in the email. A scientific study "confirmed" that the Pfizer vaccine causes neurological damage. Journaliste fact-checking sant environnement. The National File article is based on a single study, Covid-19 RNA Based Vaccines and the Risk of Prion Disease by J. Bart Classen, a licensed physician in Maryland, from the journal Microbiology & Infectious Diseases. Reports are not verified before they're published, and the CDCsays on its websitethat VAERS "is not designed to determine if a vaccine caused or contributed to an adverse event. It also promotes several false, misleading and unproven theories, including claims thatspike proteins resulting from the vaccines are toxicandthat the shots may belinked to prion diseaseand Bell's palsy. The vaccine, which is based on BioNTech proprietary mRNA technology, was developed by both BioNTech and Pfizer. One of its co-authors, Dr. Peter McCollough, has previously promotedmisinformation about COVID-19. The current coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, which is caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), remains a major threat to global health. "It means that one in 17 reports, where the outcome was not unknown or the illness was ongoing, was fatal," Full Fact said. Ascreenshot of the first page accompaniesthe post and provides an explanation: The messenger RNA, or mRNA, used in the vaccines trigger abnormally shaped proteins, the basis for prion and other neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer's and Lou Gehrig's disease, also known as ALS or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. "The body is filled with RNA. The mRNA vaccines differ from previously offered inoculations in that instead of confronting the immune system with part of a virus in a weakened or deactivated form to build antibodies, they give it a blueprint of a part of the virus (the spike protein) that the body can then recognize and fight when confronted by it later. Similar claims have accumulated thousands of interactions on Facebook and Instagram, according to CrowdTangle, a social media insights tool. In an email to the outlet, Robert Garry, a virologist at Tulane University and an expert in the molecular mechanisms of viral pathogenesis, said that Classen offers no statistical analysis to show that these occur more frequently in the sequence derived from the SARS-CoV-2 spike gene. Individuals who have received one dose of Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine should receive a second dose of Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine to complete the vaccination series, Vaccination providers must report Adverse Events in accordance with the Fact Sheet to VAERS at, Vaccination providers should review the Fact Sheet for Information to Provide to Vaccine Recipients/Caregivers and Mandatory Requirements for Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine Administration Under Emergency Use Authorization, Please see Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) Fact Sheet for Healthcare Providers Administering Vaccine (Vaccination Providers) including Full EUA Prescribing Information available at. Elsewhere in the so-called "Pfizer documents" being misinterpreted online, the report concluded that the data does not reveal "any novel safety concerns or risks requiring label changes" and supports a "favorable benefit risk profile" for the vaccine. For a discussion of these and other risks and uncertainties, see BioNTechs Annual Report as Form 20-F for the Year Ended December 31, 2020, filed with the SEC on March 30, 2021, which is available on the SECs website at www.sec.gov. Classen asserts that, through his completely undescribed methodology, he found a series of RNA sequences that "may cause" TDP-43 or FUS to fold into a pathogenic form. Users can access and consult this website and use the share features available for personal, private, and non-commercial purposes. This type of vaccine gives your cells instructions for how to make the S protein found on the surface of the COVID-19 virus. Any forward-looking statements in this press release are based on BioNTech current expectations and beliefs of future events, and are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially and adversely from those set forth in or implied by such forward-looking statements. Every day, Pfizer colleagues work across developed and emerging markets to advance wellness, prevention, treatments and cures that challenge the most feared diseases of our time. Safety data from the Phase 3 study has also been collected from more than 12,000 vaccinated participants who have a follow-up time of at least six months after the second dose, demonstrating a favorable safety and tolerability profile. Most of them have no cure. Learn about specific ways our research is leading to medicines and vaccines that will benefit patients around the world. cause prion disease. As 1,223 is around 6 percent of 21,325, people wrongly interpreted the data to mean you have around a one in 17 chance of dying after taking the vaccine. "The body is filled with RNA. "CDC continues to recommend that everyone who is eligible should get vaccinated.". A number of people on social media arrived at the figure after noting that 21,002 people had recovered to some extent after taking the vaccine. Introduction. Dr. Classen has not demonstrated by any stretch of the imagination that the sequences in the Pfizer vaccine are special or unexpected beyond anything that occurs purely by chance.". Background. "Covid19 vaxines (sic) are associated with Prion's disease (sic), which you may better recognize Mad Cow Disease," writes Facebook user Rachel LeBert Cox in a March 23 post. In other words, these are big claims that challenge some very basic scientific concepts, and they rely entirely on us taking Classen at his word methodologically. In April 2021, the right-wing National File promoted this same study, describing the research as "credible" apparently basing this conclusion on nothing more than the fact that it appears in what looks to be a legitimate scientific journal. The claim that COVID-19 vaccines can cause prion and other neurodegenerative diseases isFALSE, based on our research. "This is incorrect. A total of 697 cases of COVID-19 were observed in the United States; 647 cases of COVID-19 were observed in the placebo group versus 50 in the vaccine group, indicating vaccine efficacy of 92.6% (95% CI, [90.1, 94.5]). FOX News national security correspondent Jennifer Griffin has the latest on 'Special Report' At least 36 people may have developed a rare blood disorder, known as immune thrombocytopenia (ITP) ,. These data also provide the first clinical results that a vaccine can effectively protect against currently circulating variants, a critical factor to reach herd immunity and end this pandemic for the global population.. See the sources for this fact-check A research article making the. The emergency use of this product is only authorized for the duration of the declaration that circumstances exist justifying the authorization of emergency use of the medical product under Section 564 (b) (1) of the FD&C Act unless the declaration is terminated or authorization revoked sooner. ", Seneff also erroneously cited as evidence theVAERS database, which she said contains "many reports that are indicative of inflammation of various major nerves in the head.". ", Fact check: Experts debunk claim that COVID-19 pneumonia is an allergic reaction, Some data suggest "a possible association between COVID-19 vaccines and a slight increase in risk of certain neurodegenerative diseases," according to experts on Meedan's Health Desk. The phrase "Pfizer documents" became a top trending topic on Twitter, thanks in part to a tweet posted by Georgia Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, who previously had her personal Twitter account permanently suspended for "repeated violations" of the social media site's COVID-19 misinformation policy. Read the press release and listen to themedia call. Pfizer and BioNTech plan to submit detailed data for scientific peer review and potential publication in the near future. Since outbreaks of BSE in the 1990s and early 2000s, regulations on how cattle are handled and fedhave greatly prevented transmission from animals to humans. Imagine if the origami crane with a broken wing caused all of its origami crane friends to develop broken wings. Classen claims in his paper: RNA based vaccines offers (sic) special risks of inducing specific adverse events. Alzheimer's disease (AD), Parkinson's disease (PD), and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) are three of the major neurodegenerative diseases. Such a finding would be important, Classen argued, because folded versions of these prions have been linked to neurologic disease. The report said it had drawn the data from . "Sure why do we even need scientists when we have conspiracy theorists on the internet eh? The Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine uses new messenger RNA (mRNA) technology, which contains brief genetic instructions for human cells to temporarily manufacture proteins that mimic a small. ( Natural News) A woman in Florida died of a rare brain disease three months after she received her second Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine. Association between type 1 diabetes and Hib vaccine, subscribe to our print edition, ad-free app or electronic newspaper replica here, Your California Privacy Rights / Privacy Policy, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, updated March 31, ", National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Oct. 21, 2019, ", Johns Hopkins Medicine, accessed March 31, ", U.S. Food and Drug Administration, July 23, 2020, ", U.S. Department of Agriculture Animal and Plan Health Inspection Service, June 2, 2020, ", U.S. Food and Drug Administration, Nov. 20, 2020, ", U.S. Food and Drug Administration, Nov. 30, 2020, ", Dr. Angela Rasmussen, March 31, Twitter interview. In February 2021, anti-vaccine activist and conspiracy theorist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. shared a Facebook post purporting to describe "new research" published by "veteran immunologist" J. Bart Classen in a journal named Microbiology & Infectious Diseases.