Immunologists in a report say vaccines like the Pfizer one produce flu-like symptoms in about 60 per cent of recipients after the second dose. Photo / Supplied
Aches and pains after Covid vaccination are a good sign.
When I got my Covid jabs last month, I was quite pleased I didn't get any nasty flu-like symptoms afterwards, but after reading a recent report in Science Immunology I now rather wish I was flu-ish afterwards.
The immunologists writing
the report said mRNA vaccines, like the Pfizer vaccine we are receiving, produce flu-like symptoms in about 60 per cent of recipients after the second dose of the vaccine. These are due to an abundant production of interferons, cell-signalling proteins that play a vital role in activating an immune response.
Your body produces these soon after contact with pathogens and they have powerful antiviral effects throughout the body, suppressing replication by the virus, and thus preventing the spread of the virus elsewhere.
mRNA vaccines for other viruses are powerful inducers of interferon, so it is likely that the side effects of the Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine are byproducts of a healthy burst of interferon generation at the same time as the stimulation of an effective immune response. These effects occur more frequently in females than in males and are more severe in younger people than the elderly, and we know that that interferon production is substantially stronger in females than males, and in younger rather than older people.
