COVID-19 Vaccines

My patients want to know whether to get the COVID vaccine. I am pretty up-front about being among the more vaccine-hesitant doctors. Nonetheless, when the COVID vaccine became available to me, I took it immediately. So I want to explain my thinking about this vaccine and why it was the best choice for me. 

First, any illness that causes widespread death and devastation, as well as unknown long-lasting health consequences, is the exact sort of illness that we should vaccinate against.  

Second, with each vaccine anyone gets, there is a risk benefit balance. This is true every single time we do anything that alters the balance of the immune system.  Vaccines do alter the immune system.  So do diet, stress, sleep, and other germs. Living as healthfully as one can involves navigating risk.  In the case of COVID-19, risk from the illness far outweighs the risk from the vaccine from everything I can see.  

There are 2 things about the COVID vaccine itself that make me feel more comfortable getting it than I typically feel about vaccines. Both involve things that are not in the currently available COVID vaccines:

There are no preservatives in the Moderna or Pfizer vaccines.   When I can do so, I avoid preservatives, especially metal preservatives that the body has difficulty clearing. Aluminum and mercury are often used as preservatives in vaccines.  With my genetically fragile brain, I am not interested in having any extra aluminum or mercury in my body.  I carefully avoid metals when choosing food, drinking containers, skin care products and supplements.  Metals accumulate in the brain and are found at the sites of dementia-causing amyloid plaques. I understand that the amount of metal contained in vaccines is extremely low. Nonetheless I try to avoid it.  In this case there was no decision to make because the vaccine is free of metals.  

There are no adjuvants in the currently available COVID vaccines. Adjuvants are chemicals that are added to vaccines. Their purpose is to push hard on the immune system so that the immune system forms antibodies. My concern with adjuvants is that their job is to induce inflammation.  Thus, it seems reasonable to question whether they are a player in autoimmune illness.  During the time that we increased the number of vaccines that Americans get, we have also quite radically increased the number of us suffering with autoimmune illness and dementia. I don’t believe that vaccines are the sole cause of any of these problems. I believe that they are caused by a combination of factors: genetics, germs, and lifestyle factors such as stress, poor diet, and lack of sleep. However, I continue to wonder whether adjuvants worsen the situation by pushing just a little bit harder on the immune system than some people can handle. Given that I strive to keep my immune system in balance, I would have hesitated a bit more about getting a vaccine containing adjuvants.  

Had it been otherwise I would have had a struggle.  I would have hesitated a bit longer perhaps, but I believe that I would have gotten the vaccine nonetheless – largely because I could not bear to infect someone else.  But with no preservatives and no adjuvants, I had no struggle and no hesitation. I pushed up my sleeve and had only to deal with my fear of needles. The nurse who vaccinated me said I was far braver the second time. I had no reaction to either shot other than a sore arm after the first one.

My patients who have or who have had Lyme disease or other chronic inflammatory illness express concern that they will worsen if they have the COVID vaccine. I have not seen this reaction and do not anticipate it. However, my patients with Lyme disease also seemed to have a stronger and more prolonged reactions to COVID-19 when they are infected. I see absolutely no reason to assume that the vaccine would be worse than the illness.