So I was talking to a Naturopathic Physician friend of mine who lives and practices in Southern California and she was asking my opinion about getting vaccinated. I told her I was for the vaccine and asked her what the obstacle was that she was trying to overcome regarding getting vaccinated. She told me that the Naturopathic Community was touting anti-vaccine propaganda. No, she did not use those words but that is what it is! I stopped immersing myself in the Naturopathic Community Propaganda as soon as I graduated from school. Even before leaving school, I started taking myself to MD and DO based continuing education conferences because I prefered to have a "real world" perspective about what the medical professionals outside of Naturopathy were teaching themselves. The entire world is immersed in this pandemic but roughly half of the population of the United States is acting "badly", refusing to wear masks, physically distance themselves in public or stay out of the public entirely when possible and now I am understanding that many, many, many people are refusing to get vaccinated at all.
Can you imagine if the general population refused to get the polio vaccine?!?!?!?!?!?!?
I understand that there are people out there who are fearful of what the vaccination contains and how it works, so I thought that I might put out information regarding these issues. My intention is to follow this blog up with a video that further explains what I am trying to say in the written word. But until then, I will do my best in this format.
The next bit of information was extrapolated from the CDC website, listed above.
How do mRNA vaccines work?
mRNA vaccines teach our cells how to make a protein—or even just a piece of a protein—that triggers an immune response inside our bodies. The whole purpose of a immune response is to produce antibodies.
Antibodies are the part of the immune system that are going to protect us from getting infected if or when the real virus enters our bodies.
How is the mRNA vaccine different from other vaccines?
Many vaccinations are derived from actual "live" or "active" virus coding or they are made from "attenuated" virus which means that the virus itself is inactivated. But as mentioned above, the mRNA vaccine, teaches our bodies how to make the spike protein that triggers all the nasty reactions in our immune system... okay, before you get all ramped up and full of anxiety, remember: the vaccine only contains a small amount of the virus coding so that when your body makes the virus from the code, only a small amount of virus is made, period. When the virus invades your body without this prior notification, then the virus has the potential to wreak havoc on you, your emotions, your body, all the organs and especially your brain and nervous system.
Beyond vaccines, cancer research has used mRNA to trigger the immune system to target specific cancer cells.
The following was taken from the NYU Langone website listed above:
Defending the Body Against COVID-19 Viruses can’t reproduce themselves. They need a host. The coronavirus uses a spike protein to gain entry into the cells and start the replication process that makes us sick. In developing mRNA vaccines, scientists zeroed in on a unique spike protein that is found on the surface of the virus. On its own, this spike protein is incapable of causing COVID-19. The mRNA vaccines work by relaying a set of instructions for how to build this protein, with the goal of teaching your immune system how to disarm it.
After injection, the vaccine particles come into contact with immune system cells and deliver the mRNA message: you need to make this spike protein, and here’s how. As the vaccinated cells start churning out the spike protein, other immune system cells realize that the protein should not be there. That’s when the battle begins.
“The immune system starts building an immune response and making antibodies,” says Aisha Langford, PhD, MPH, assistant professor in NYU Langone’s Department of Population Health. “And that’s how we train the immune system to recognize the spike protein, and that’s what protects us from being infected.”
Your body continues to produce antibodies until all the spike proteins have been destroyed. At the end of this natural immune process, your immune system has the knowledge it needs to recognize the spike protein and fend off future exposure to the virus. So if the virus enters the body, the immune system will identify and attack it.
Reactions after receiving the vaccine, such as headaches, chills, joint pain, and muscle soreness at the injection site, are normal and expected. “These are not allergic reactions, but actually a sign that the vaccine is producing an immune response,” says Michael S. Phillips, MD, NYU Langone’s chief epidemiologist.
The mRNA vaccines do not enter the nucleus of the cell, so it cannot change your DNA. After the mRNA delivers instructions to your cells, the body breaks it down and eliminates it.
The following was borrowed from the Havard Health Blog listed above:
About 30 years ago, a handful of scientists began exploring whether vaccines could be made more simply. What if you knew the exact structure of the mRNA that made the critical piece of a virus’s protein coat, such as the spike protein of the COVID-19 virus?
Along the way, they learned that, compared to traditional vaccines, mRNA vaccines can actually generate a stronger type of immunity: they stimulate the immune system to make antibodies and immune system killer cells — a double strike at the virus.
Then along came COVID-19
So, 30 years of painstaking research allowed several groups of scientists — including a group at Pfizer working with a German company called BioNTech, and a young company in Massachusetts called Moderna — to bring mRNA vaccine technology to the threshold of actually working. The companies had built platforms that, theoretically, could be used to create a vaccine for any infectious disease simply by inserting the right mRNA sequence for that disease.
Then along came COVID-19.
Within weeks of identifying the responsible virus, scientists in China had determined the structure of all of its genes, including the genes that make the spike protein, and published this information on the Internet.
Within minutes, scientists 10,000 miles away began working on the design of an mRNA vaccine. Within weeks, they had made enough vaccine to test it in animals, and then in people.
Just 11 months after the discovery of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, regulators in the United Kingdom and the US confirmed that an mRNA vaccine for COVID-19 is effective and safely tolerated, paving the path to widespread immunization.
Previously, no new vaccine had been developed in less than four years.
There you have it, folks, I have found information for you from respected leaders in the fields of health as well as medical advancement. The mRNA vaccine for COVID-19 may be the first of its kind to be put to good use, but it is far from the first attempt made in the field of vaccinations.
Whatever other faults the vaccine may have, efficacy is not one of them! There are facts, the truth and statistics... and then there is science! Science stands alone (okay, maybe it stands with the cheese).
Science does not care what the "facts" are; science is uninterested in "statistics"; science isn't caught up in labels of any kind. Science merely follows the evidence in a logical progression and processes the data without emotion or desire to see a particular outcome. Science enters with an open mind and curiosity, eager to find out the answer. People will try to push an agenda and people will try to prove what might be there, but science will demonstrate what actually is...
I hope that I have provided you with information that is digestible, knowledgeable and worth the time it took to read. For what it is worth, it is my opinion that the vaccine is worthy, valid and necessary to pull us up out of this public health hazard that has been labeled COVID-19.
My name is Dr. Lauren Pihlgren (no pill makes you Grin, like Dr. Pill-grin).
I am a Naturopathic Physician, Certified CBT provider and Emotional Wellness Expert. I specialize in helping kids, teens and young adults feel comfortable in their own skin and my mission is to provide people with tools and skills to make better, informed and conscious decisions.
Thank you for reading my blog and website.