Articles related to VACCINES/IMMUNIZATION

The film focuses on embalmers and funeral directors who claim to be coming forward to share their concerns over “unusual blood clots” found during prepared for burial, and Ryan Cole, MD, a promoter of false claims about the COVID vaccines and cancer. In the end, it is a combination of lies, theatrics, and scare tactics that rehash already-debunked claims.

The new Moderna bivalent vaccine showed higher antibody development vs BA.4/BA.5 than the original version and also showed activity (although lower) against the new BQ1.1 strain. The Pfizer-BioNTech bivalent vaccine generated 3- to 5-fold higher antibody levels than the original vaccine against BA.4/.5 and 11-fold higher levels vs the newer variants.

In a recently published prospective cohort study, a third dose of the BioNTech Pfizer vaccine yielded a sustained immunologic response. But response to a fourth was much smaller and was gone completely by 13 weeks, providing only a short-term benefit over the third dose. A fourth dose should therefore be timed based on disease waves or be provided seasonally, like the influenza vaccine.

Two JAMA papers suggest that more side effects correlates with higher levels of anti-spike antibodies. But anti-spike antibodies develop even in individuals who experienced evident reaction, with the possible exception of those on immunosuppressant regimens.

In a high-risk population, vaccination was better than prior infection, with incremental increase in protection with additional vaccination doses. Prior infection in unvaccinated individuals ranged from 16% to 49% vs omicron infection Versus unvaccinated, previously uninfected individuals, vaccine effectiveness at preventing omicron infection ranged from 19% to 83% with 2 doses and 41% to 88% with 3 doses Three vaccine doses offered significantly more protection than two doses, including among previously infected persons

Aniruddha Hazra, MD, of Howard Brown Health in Chicago, and colleagues found that of 90 people who tested positive for monkeypox following a single dose of Jynneos, 77% of the cases happened within 14 days of the first dose and 14% occurred within 14-28 days of the first dose. Five positive tests were returned following a second dose of the modified vaccinia Ankara-Bavarian Nordic (MVA-BN) vaccine in the eight cases that occurred 28 days after vaccine initiation.