Posted by alexandra_k on February 2, 2021, at 13:18:50
In reply to Re: Who has gotten a Covid Vaccine Experiences? » linkadge, posted by Phillipa on February 2, 2021, at 11:41:31
These are scary times for freedom of speech, yeah.
One concern that I have heard is that anti-bodies have the potential to bind not just to the pathogens that we want them to bind to -- but to parts of the persons body (which is one form of auto-immune disorder).
So, for example, it's important to take anti-biotics for a Streptococcal infection because otherwise if the body makes a lot of anti-bodies against the Streptococcal those antibodies have a tendancy to not only bind Streptococcal but also bind to some protein on heart valves. That means the body's own immune response to Streptococcal involves an auto-immune response to heart valves. It destroys the heart valves and that creates problems.
(I actually need to check whether the antibodies are complexing with a protein in the heart valve or whether the natural killer cells are destroying them since the bacteria-antibody complexes are stuck to the valves and not getting to the spleen maybe it's more that that the mechanism for removal of the anti-body-bacteria complexes can't get them without destroying surrounding tissue).
But the point is that the body makes anti-bodies... And then the response to those anti-bodies is too broad. Not just the anti-body-pathogen complex is targeted for destruction.
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There are other auto-immune disorders like that, too. The body can start making anti-bodies that bind to proteins on red blood cells, for example. Then the red blood cells are destroyed (along with the bound antibody) by the macrophages in the spleen resulting in anemia.
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So there is a concern that when anti-bodies are produced by the body they might have un-intended targets and bind to things more broadly than just the pathogen antigen that they are supposed to.
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So... One might have a concern that with any immunisation that is intended to get the body making antibodies to protect against pathogen... That the body might produce antibodies that decide to attach to things that they shouldn't. And that there be destruction of important or crucial self-tissue. Or.. that the body might produce a lot of antibodies and the excess antibodies might (because of overcrowding) start to fold weirdly or congeal weirdly or something like that... Causing problems (a sort of a prion or prion-like problem)...
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Pre-disposing factors?
There are particular genotypes that have been found to be associated with very very strong immune responses (over-active immune responses). So there's a genetic test for susceptibility to develop auto-immmune disease.
There are also signs that someone is susceptible. People who have a few different signs... Lupis... Allergies... (Certain particular kinds of allergies)...
Being older female puts people at higher risk of auto-immune disorders. They reckon it's got something to do with having had kids (but I might be making this up actually -- that might just be my theory). Exposure to foetuses is a risk factor for developing an anti-body response to the foetus... And to something in the foetus that also goes on to target oneself...
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But these disorders are RARE. If people didn't get vaccinated because they were worried about these rare conditions... It would be a bit like not leaving the house because one was afraid of being struck by lightening or being hit by a bus.
That being said... Maybe don't go out in a lightening storm... Maybe cross at the cross-walk... Maybe if you have a history of auto-immune problems have a chat to your doctor about what dose of vaccine is right for you (if vaccine is right for you at a very early stage)...
That's all I mean to say with that, really.
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I looked into the mRNA vaccine development thing a bit more after my post yesterday... They have been in development for a while but various things they needed to figure and they needed a cash injection by the seems of it -- which they surely got.
The lofty goal is that with mRNA technology they can make very very particular vaccinations very very quickly. So they can not just choose to vaccinate against a few strands of flu every year, they can develop more strands. They can develop new updates in real time (with respect to targeting variants). That's the idea.
I suspect that the next thing will be learning about how specific we need to be with the vaccines so we don't produce auto-immune disorders en mass (I mean if we start wanting to vaccinate each person against every pathogen we've ever discovered)...
poster:alexandra_k
thread:1113573
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20210120/msgs/1113597.html