The COVID-19 Vaccine

Some people are still “on the fence” about whether to get the new COVID vaccine. My review of the science, as well as reviews by health professionals and scientists who have much more expertise, has led me to conclude that you SHOULD get the vaccine. I want to share with you an explanation of how it was developed.

 

How Does the COVID-19 Vaccine Work?

Anything foreign to your body, such as a virus or protein, gets attacked by your own immune cells. It takes time to ramp up production to build a full attack (a few days), meanwhile, the nasty COVID virus begins replicating in your body after you are exposed. Once your immune system fights off the virus, it “remembers” it with its memory cells.

 

The scientists found the part of the DNA code from the COVID virus and made a copy of that blueprint as mRNA (messenger RNA) version. mRNA is literally just like a set of instructions about how to make something. These mRNA instructions literally “are” the vaccine.

 

The vaccine itself contains NO actual part of the virus. When you get the vaccine, your body’s cells say “sure, I will follow those instructions and make this protein”. Your immune system immediately sees this new protein being produced by your body and starts attacking it.

 

Your body bombs the heck out of this protein and destroys it. Now your memory cells will “remember” that protein, and exactly how to destroy it. Meanwhile, your body also breaks down the mRNA instructions pretty quickly too, since they are no longer needed. So the mRNA vaccine is also gone from your body permanently.

 

So when a COVID virus enters your body, your body’s immune system has “memory” of that protein, and uses those blueprints to immediately attack the virus, BEFORE the protein drills into your cells! The mRNA Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines are actually brilliant at a science level, more so than previously manufactured vaccines.

 

I hope this brief explanation of how the COVID vaccine works helps you decide, as I have, that we all need to take this vaccine ASAP! Please refer to COVID-19 Info Page for further information.

 

Stay Healthy,
Angela Solis, Pharmacist