‘We need to stop the fear mongering on vaccines’
The HinduThe COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated a fringe anti-vaccine movement, previously limited to niche communities, either sceptical about vaccine benefits, or suspicious of vaccination motives. The trigger for this was a court submission by Astra Zeneca that its COVID-19 vaccine, ChAdOx1-nCoV19, manufactured as Covishield by Serum Institute in India, can in rare cases cause clots due to TTS. While we do not have sufficient Indian data for Covishield, it is clear from global data that COVID-19 increased the risk of subsequent thrombotic events, including heart attacks and strokes by three-four fold, even after the infection was fully resolved. It seems that this is a rare side effect of the current recombinant DNA platform technology, since a similar vaccine used in America, developed by Johnson and Johnson, also increased TTS risk. Overall, it seems that the same powerful induction of immune response that makes DNA vaccines effective also carries a small risk of inducing auto-immune responses that lead to side effects.