Pascal Oparada
On Tik-Tok, the video-sharing social media platform, there is a vaccine challenge.
Users are asked to post their coronavirus vaccine reactions after getting a jab. The users would jerk intermittently in the middle of activities to show the effects the vaccine is having or has had on them.
The response to the vaccine challenge on Tik-Tok is a global perception trailing the release of the coronavirus vaccine.
The world has waited with bated breath for a respite from a virus that has infected and killed millions and destabilised economies around the world.
People are either dying or getting serious ‘side effects’ after getting vaccinated against coronavirus.
Some reports of effects are too serious. Most of the cases are with those who have pre-existing conditions.
The culprit, mostly, is the Pfizer-BioNtech vaccine. Reported cases of people dying hours, in some cases, minutes after taking the vaccine are many.
It appears the Pfizer vaccine is not having it easy.
Nearly a third of COVID-19 patients who needed hospital treatment were readmitted within 140 days, a study suggests.
Researchers studied 47,780 people who had been in hospital with coronavirus in hospitals in England and found evidence to suggest those who recovered from the virus had increased rates of respiratory and cardiovascular problems, as well as diabetes.
‘Perfectly healthy’ doctor does days after getting the vaccine
The grieving wife of a leading Florida doctor has told DailyMail how her ‘perfect’ husband died from a mystery blood disorder – just days after getting the Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine.
Heidi Neckelmann says her obstetrician husband, Gregory Michael, 56 – her ‘best friend’ and partner of 28 years – was active, healthy and had no pre-existing conditions before getting the jab on December 18.
However, he died from a stroke Sunday morning after suddenly developing a rare autoimmune illness that causes the body to destroy its own platelets, the tiny fragments that help the blood to clot.
Distraught Heidi, 58, thinks the groundbreaking Pfizer-BioNtech vaccine may have somehow been the trigger and is to blame.
“In my mind, his death was 100 per cent linked to the vaccine. There is no other explanation,” she told DailyMail.
“He was in very good health. He didn’t smoke, he drank alcohol once in a while but only socially. He worked out, we had kayaks, he was a deep-sea fisherman.
“They tested him for everything you can imagine afterwards, even cancer, and there was absolutely nothing else wrong with him.”
Pfizer told DailyMail that it was aware of Dr Michael’s ‘highly unusual’ death and was investigating further.
However, a spokesman cautioned: “We don’t believe at this time that there is any direct connection to the vaccine.”
When he checked himself into Mount Sinai Medical Center in Miami Beach, the hospital where he works and had the groundbreaking vaccine, medics discovered he was suffering from an acute lack of platelets.
“All the blood results came back normal except for the platelets which came back as zero,” Heidi said.
“At first they thought it must be a mistake. So they did the test again and this time did a manual count which is supposed to be more accurate. This time it showed just one platelet.
“He felt 100 per cent, he was normal, energetic, happy. But they said you cannot go home, this is incredibly dangerous, you could suffer a brain bleed and die.’
Normally doctors would expect a range of between 150,000 to 450,000 platelets per microliter of blood.
A hospital worker with no prior case was admitted to the hospital after taking the Pfizer vaccine.
The unidentified female worker suffered an anaphylactic reaction shortly after receiving the injection at a hospital in Juneau, Alaska recently.
She had no prior history of allergies and was not allergic to other vaccines. The woman began to feel flush 10 minutes after receiving the vaccine and took an antihistamine.
She was taken to the emergency room at Bartlett Regional Hospital in Juneau after struggling to breathe. Emergency room director Dr Lindy Jones said the woman had an elevated heart rate and a red rash on her face and torso.
A Reuters report says four trial participants who received the Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine experienced facial paralysis, according to the Food and Drug Administration. The FDA said the issue should be monitored as the jab becomes more widely available.
The potentially concerning cases were revealed after the US drug regulator published an analysis of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine ahead of a meeting to consider emergency use authorization for the jab in the United States.
According to the documents, Bell’s palsy, a form of temporary facial paralysis, was reported by four participants during phase 3 trials. The individuals had been administered the jab, and no members of the placebo group experienced similar adverse effects.
The condition resembles a stroke, with most sufferers watching helplessly as one side of their face droops and their muscles go limp. In some rare situations, both sides of the face may become paralyzed. It is unclear what causes Bell’s palsy, although the temporary paralysis usually goes away on its own.
US officials reported more severe allergic reactions to the vaccine, another Reuters report said.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said it is carefully monitoring allergic reactions to the coronavirus vaccines from Pfizer Inc and Moderna Inc and urged individuals who had a serious reaction not to get the second dose.
In a conference call with reporters, the U.S. public health agency said allergic reactions are occurring at a rate of 11.1 per 1 million vaccinations. That compared with flu vaccines, in which such reactions occur at a rate of 1.3 per 1 million shots.
The severe reactions are still “exceedingly rare,” they said, stressing the need for people to get vaccinated when the shots become available to them, given the threat of death and serious disease from the coronavirus that has already claimed more than 357,000 lives in the United States alone.
CDC officials said 28 people who received the coronavirus vaccine developed by Pfizer and BioNTech had severe allergic reactions. They also noted one case of anaphylaxis, which can cause throat swelling and breathing difficulty, after an individual received Moderna’s vaccine.
Officials attributed the difference largely to the fact that the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine was authorized earlier than the Moderna shot, and said the precautions apply to both.
A study published on Wednesday in the CDC’s weekly report on death and disease looking at cases between Dec. 14 and Dec. 23, identified 21 cases of anaphylaxis after the administration of 1,893,360 doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine. Of these, 71 per cent occurred within the first 15 minutes after vaccine administration.
The Nigerian government has said it is expecting to receive 100,000 doses of the Pfizer vaccine by the end of January.
The country is expecting millions of doses of the Pfizer vaccine.
The Nigerian Medical Association (NMA) had asked the government to allow the body to scrutinise the vaccine before administering to the public.