Vaccine myths

I’m still alive nearly five months after I got fully vaccinated against coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19). So that’s one misconception debunked.

No. I didn’t suffer severe side effects after I got the jab. In fact, after the first injection I went to the Cebu City Sports Center to walk more than five kilometers and then had a nice bottle of rum later in the night. I did the same thing after the second injection, although I jogged instead of ran at the oval.

Also, rumors about the Covid vaccine weakening a person’s immune system, causing infertility, modifying a human’s DNA and making people magnetic are utterly basel ess.

By the way, people are drawn to me not because I’m magnetic, but because I have a magnetic personality.

I also don’t know where the public got this idea, but the vaccine doesn’t cause Covid-19.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), Sinovac and Sinopharm are inactivated vaccines made from the disease-carrying virus, which is killed using chemicals, heat or radiation. Viral vector vaccines like AstraZeneca, Sputnik V and Johnson & Johnson use a safe virus “to deliver proteins so that it can trigger an immune response without causing the disease. Meanwhile, mRNA vaccines like Pfizer and Moderna deliver “a set of instructions to the cells to teach them to make a specific protein that the immune system can recognize and respond to.” No virus is used. At all.

That should clear the air, right? But wait, there’s more.

Covid vaccines are not safe because they are experimental. Okay. So manufacturers were quick to come up with the vaccine but only because there was an urgent need to. Anyway, it was not their first time to make a vaccine or deal with a coronavirus. They’ve had years of research behind them.

The WHO has said the technology is not new. And I trust WHO. Because if you can’t trust WHO, then whom can you trust?

Now here’s where weird.

Some folks are claiming that the vaccines contain microchips that have surveillance features, which is based on conspiracy theories blaming US billionaire Bill Gates for the current health crisis. He might be guilty of creating a near monopoly, but wanting to keep track of more than seven billion people on this planet? Why?

I think this myth is for Americans because I’m pretty sure half of the Filipino population don’t know or care who Bill Gates is. I mean, he didn’t break up with Bea Alonzo or ask Ellen Adarna’s family for her hand in marriage. Seriously. And how’s this for a cause of concern. The vaccination against Covid-19 is a precursor to a zombie apocalypse. Yup. Some Filipinos actually believe that they will turn into the living dead if they get inoculated. I guess they prefer to be just plain dead.

Anyway, I hope these will change some people’s minds. Or not. Why do I care? I’ll be a zombie in two years.

— PUBLIO J. BRIONES III