Anyone feeling increasingly anxious about Pfizer?

[Doireallyneedaname]

With all the news re the AZ & J&J vaccines I can’t help but feel a sense of dread when checking the news.

I am starting to think it’s only a matter of time until something horrific comes out about the Pfizer vaccine (which I had)

What a strange time to be alive. Sometimes I still can’t believe this is all happening.

@CovoidOfAllHumanity What a measured post with great explanation.

@CovoidOfAllHumanity

Enid

What I was describing as hysterical and irrational is worrying about a vaccine (Pfizer) about which no safety concerns have been raised at all after you have had it and suffered no side effects yourself. I cannot describe that reaction in any other terms.

It's also unfair. You get the benefit of being vaccinated and yet still put others off having that benefit. Kind of dog in the manager. Irresponsible and deserves to be challenged

Numerically you are wrong about the risks of Covid vs the vaccine. The risk of dying of COVID as a young healthy person is very small but the risks of dying of the vaccine are even smaller yet.

The very reason this side effect was not picked up in trials was that it is so very rare. It's true there is much unknown and very rare side effects may still come to light but we can say with confidence they will be very rare because the trials would have picked them up otherwise. I'll take a 1 in a million risk or a 1 in 100,000 risk to get us out of this pandemic.

If your personal weigh up is that you feel safer to risk COVID than a vaccine that is absolutely fine. No-one at all is forcing you to have a vaccine. It's an individual decision.

I can even understand people wanting to discuss whether to have it who haven't yet but I still cannot fathom the need to post on social media to angst about it after you have had it.

Thank you for a measured post.

I agree, there is no point agonising over it after having had it. The time to worry and do the research was beforehand. Once you've had it, you've had it, and the chances of a bad outcome are, of course, very low. The OP really doesn't have very much to worry about. I do acknowledge that.

What I object to is the rhetoric that anyone who questions the vaccine or has concerns is irrational and hysterical and needs to be beaten into submission by statistics and ridicule. I'm not saying you have done this, by the way. I think you have been fair and measured. What you put into your body is your choice and I don't like the fact that there has been such a heavy handed approach to this vaccine rollout in basically telling everyone it's safe and nothing to worry about when actually that's not the whole picture.

I don't take medication, ever, unless I've been advised by my doctor that I have to otherwise an infection won't clear itself. I never take painkillers. I just prefer to not put medications into my body unless I feel I 100% need it. And, for me personally, the risk of blood clots is more serious as we have a family history of blood clotting disorders. I have always been advised not to take the contraceptive pill as a consequence. So, for me, the worry about blood clots is much more relevant than it might be for others and as such, having weighed it all up, I'm happy with my choice that not having the vaccine is right for me at this stage of my life.

I appreciate your contribution to the discussion, because it's important that all voices and views are heard.

@HerRoyalNotness don't think that's true

Thanks Enid
I respect your opinion too

People have greatly differing views about the value of medicines etc and it's a personal thing.

Obviously as a Dr I am generally pro medicine. I will happily pop painkillers for a headache rather than grin and bear it.

However I do also acknowledge that many people are hugely over invested in having a pill for something that lifestyle measures would be as good or better for eg losing weight to combat diabetes, Pilates for back pain, mindfulness for anxiety.

My views are definitely not that there is a pill for every ill and I very much do acknowledge that there are side effects and risks of all drugs and it's for each person to weigh what they are comfortable with.

I’m not particularly someone for taking a pill and relatively medicine free but am very proud vaccine.

Of course if someone has a specific medical background that makes them personally assess with Dr or without, absolutely up to them.

I have more issue with general sweeping statements that undermine public confidence in what is working to get us out of this.

Doesn’t this happen with all vaccines though? I remember headlines about the HPV vaccine. It’s just so prominent because right now Covid is pretty much the world focus.

Pro not proud

The other thing is if you are personally more at risk it helps if others around you have it so it doesn’t make sense to undermine their confidence.

If you want to be very selfish about it then of course the best position is to refuse it yourself but make sure everyone else has it so you benefit from herd immunity with no personal risk.

Classical prisoners dilemma

If you have it yourself and then put everyone else off then that is definitely irrational and not even in your own interests

No, not worried. Had my first one in February and due my second in May. Dh had his first Pfizer about 10 days ago.

Not worried at all about it.

I know these are different clots but all blood clots can be fatal.
We are now aware and know what symptoms to look out for and can get medical treatment if the worst were to happen.

I had covid in October and was in hospital. One of the first things they looked for was blood clots. I had been rushed to hospital with a very real risk of heart attack or stroke.

Whilst they were looking for a different type of clot, the clots still had the potential for fatality. And they are a lot more common with covid than the type of clot potentially found with the vaccine.

I don't know why I continue to read these threads, they're so frustrating. The same regurgitated arguments are continually being put forward by the same group of posters.

If you have a concern about receiving any of the vaccines, that is something you're fully entitled to hold. But, can those posters please (I'm asking nicely) stop with all the negativity that might influence others to decline the vaccine, of any brand.
I don't know if It was on this thread or another, they're all so similar, but someone explained that in normal circumstances, a vaccine or any medication would be utilised over several years and the incidences of the very, very rare side effects would be so negligible it wouldn't make headline news.

It is possible to disagree without being disagreeable.

I’m a retired doctor and have my second Pfizer shot booked for Monday. No qualms whatsoever.
I have been suffering from long Covid for over a year, and the first Pfizer dose gave me quite a lengthy remission, with an improvement in my breathlessness. I am hoping for a similar respite after my second.
Any risk of vaccine induced thrombosis is still far lower than the risks of actual Covid infection.

Every single medication has incredibly rare side effects. These are incredibly rare.

I am a healthcare student. I have my second vaccine on Friday. I had a really sore arm from the first one.

I have also had Covid

I have a couple of friends with long Covid.

I will take the risk of the vaccine rather than have Covid again. Feeling that ill was horrendous. And I only had a mild dose.

The two people I know with long Covid are pretty much disabled by it at the moment. It has been a year.

There is a risk with the vaccine- and any vaccine, I have weighed that up though. And on balance I think I would take the risk.

@CovoidOfAllHumanity have always wanted to ask someone knowledgeable this question. Is it true that the vaccine side effects mimic Covid, but milder? I felt so rough for 24 hrs after my vaccine; would hate to get Covid if that is what it feels like ( but far worse!)

[quote Doireallyneedaname]@ineedaholidaynow This isn’t DVT though, is it.[/quote]
I don’t understand this. Are you trying to say that death from a dvt isn’t as bad as death by brain clot even though the end result is the same? I doubt families of those who have died from dvt would make a distinction.

in reply to the OP and title, no absolutely not and still very happily have the AZ vaccine too if offered.

@Porcupineintherough

It's just so weird that people are more anxious about the vaccine than they are about the actual virus. However you cut the figures, whatever your personal risk, it's just so obvious which one is the bigger potential threat.

I can just see people in 30 or 40 years time being diagnosed with cancer, or a blood clot, or dementia and blaming the cv vaccine they had in 2021.

I think it's something to do with a sense of having no control over the presence of the virus, but control over whether or not to get the vaccine, leading to downplaying the risks associated with the former and overblowing those associated with the latter.

The Pfizer vaccine does not alter genes in any way. I do think under the guise of "being worried" or "having concerns" posters are spreading absolute misinformation on this and nearly every thread.

It's such a tiny percentage it really hasn't worried me. I inject a drug that has to be done in hospital for the first dose as there's such a high risk of anaphylaxis. Side effects also include increased risk of cancer and it has a black box warning
I weighed up the pros and cons, same as the vaccine. For me as CEV, it's a no brainer and to be honest even if I wasn't shielding I would still have had it

I understand your anxiety. I've had both doses and since then my daughter has been telling me about some video she was sent (I won't go into details here because might make anxiety worse) and as much as I knew they probably are not true, it still scared and worried me.

I have a friend in ICU in his 40s abroad with Covid. Our global company has Covid deaths currently every day. We are so so lucky to have these vaccines. I think some peoples risk assessments are badly skewed honesty. But then my DH - also abroad is begging his GP to give him the AZ jab. And she won’t because the government has banned it for under 60 year olds because they prefer to ‘err on the side of caution’. Ah so it’s fine then to let a novel virus run unchecked. That is also erring on the side of caution is it? And chuck away and refuse to export a vaccine that is our way out of this that has minuscule side effects - as does every vaccine or medicine we take.

I find this whole thing verging on insanity honestly.