And a third example of biomarkers that indicate a vaccination side effect: A team of researchers from Chicago has just shown that the bodies of some Covid-19 patients make antibodies that bind against both the virus and angiotensin 2. This endogenous enzyme plays an important role in regulating blood pressure. If this system gets messed up, patients can end up in the intensive care unit because of circulatory problems. The team of scientists showed in mice that a corona vaccination can also produce such antibodies.
“It is very plausible that this mechanism applies not only to blood platelet antigens but also to brain antigens,” says Harald Prüß. Antigens are the sites on body cells in the blood, brain or elsewhere to which antibodies bind. That’s why his team is now looking for the exact mechanism behind the impaired consciousness that the older patient had. “I think that with intensified research over the next year or two, we can clearly show the mechanisms that lead to such post-vac symptoms.”
Exact figures on the frequency of the disorder have so far been difficult to determine and are therefore still missing. Harald Prüß estimates that a low single-digit percentage of long-Covid patients actually suffer from post-vac syndrome with neuronal symptoms such as cognitive disorders or severe exhaustion.
Vaccination remains the smaller risk
Two years after the start of the vaccination campaign and after billions of vaccine doses administered worldwide, it is evident that the vast majority of serious vaccination side effects are extremely rare and can be treated well. So people who are afraid of the side effects of a corona vaccination can rest easy.
Ulrike Protzer, Director of the Institute of Virology at the Technical University of Munich, sees it that way: “If you take the risk of myocarditis: It’s five to ten times higher after an infection than after a vaccination.” British researchers have come to the end of that found out in a comparison in a large study in 2021, in which they compared cases of myocarditis and other cardiovascular diseases after the vaccinations and after Covid diseases. Protzer adds: If you go through several infections with the new corona virus, this risk adds up with each illness. In the third corona infection, by a factor of 15 to 30.
Covid-19 is therefore significantly more dangerous than any corona vaccination – which is not at all surprising when you consider that the vaccination only confronts the human immune system with a single component of the virus, usually the spike protein. The immune system of Covid-19 patients, on the other hand, has to deal with the entire virus. This provides many more opportunities for mimicry and cross-reactivity. In addition, a viral disease stimulates the immune system much more than a vaccination. This also increases the risk of subsequent complications. “We were already able to show in 2020 that up to 20 percent of the human antibodies that are formed after an infection and neutralize Sars-CoV-2 also bind to proteins in the mouse brain,” says Harald Prüß, the Berlin neurology professor. These are clear signs of cross-reactivity.
Patients who now suspect that the vaccination has caused serious problems in them naturally need help immediately. Your doctors must examine you thoroughly. However, neurologists rarely see the old patient with the impaired consciousness as early as after a vaccination, Prüß reports.
Doctors or patients do not always quickly identify the vaccination as a possible cause. Because these side effects are so rare, they may mistake other causes for more likely. But you should think about it early on and clarify this. Because if the vaccination and the first appearance of the symptoms were several weeks ago, important biomarkers may have disappeared from the body again.
