Episode #138 – The truth about vaccine safety

VGS This is part two of the vaccine series of Science in 5. In the first part, we spoke about some concerns that parents may have. And in this video we are going to talk to our expert, Dr Kate O'Brien, about the ingredients of the vaccine. How do we make sure that vaccines are safe? Let's start with the ingredients of the vaccine. There's a lot of information and even misinformation out there. So please unpack this for us.

KOB So I want to just go through a couple of them because they have, you know, words and names that are pretty unfamiliar in our kind of day to day lives. And I think for a lot of people it can be concerning. For some it might sound a bit scary in some way. Many of the ingredients are actually components that we have in our environment, or in our foods. Not all the components of vaccines are foreign to our bodies or our exposure. So some of the ingredients include antigens. Antigens are the part of a germ that is the actual part we want the body to develop its immunity to. It helps the immune system to actually recognize that foreign invader, that foreign germ that's going to potentially cause disease. Second, are adjuvants. And adjuvants are the part of the vaccine that help boost the immune system. Not all vaccines will result in an adequate immune response without an adjuvant. The third part that's added to a vaccine are maybe we can call them stabilizers. And these are things that make sure that the vaccine is safe during transport and during all of the moving of the vaccine around. We also have, components of the vaccine that allow for some vaccines to be used after the vaccine vial is open. If that's made with multiple doses in a vial, it needs to be safe to keep that vaccine for multiple days in the refrigerator so that the next child who comes in can receive an additional dose in the vaccine.

VGS So let's talk about the safety of the vaccine. That's a concern a lot of parents may have. There is certainly a lot of information and misinformation about it outside. Talk to us about how we ensure that vaccines are safe. What is that process that vaccines are put through before they come to market?

KOB The very first thing that happens is that when a vaccine is being developed in the clinical trials, safety is monitored extremely carefully on a day to day basis, among those who have received the vaccine. There are phone calls made, logs filled out by parents about exactly what's happening to this child. In order for a vaccine to go from a clinical trial to actually being an approved vaccine all of that safety information is rigorously evaluated, and it is assessed by experts who determine whether or not it needs safety standards. After a vaccine has been approved by a health authority the safety monitoring does not stop. In fact, safety monitoring goes out for the whole lifetime of use of a vaccine. It never actually stops. So health authorities are monitoring whether any reports are being given about potential problems with a vaccine. Now at WHO, we have a safety committee. It's an external committee of experts. And they get together and they review the reports that are submitted to the Global Monitoring Center. This is called the Global Advisory Committee on Vaccine Safety. And if a new safety issue comes up, we will issue a report around that safety issue.

VGS So let's talk about it when, there are concerns about the safety or there are concerns about a vaccine. What happens next?

KOB So what's really important for people to understand is how this system works. It doesn't mean anything to actually be telling the world how many reports came in, because you could submit a report about something that has absolutely nothing to do with the vaccine. That's why the system is completely open, we don't want to put any barriers up to people being able to report. What's done with all of those reports is a careful review of them, especially in relation to which vaccines the report says were received and to see if there are any patterns that start to emerge in the reports. If there starts to be a signal that comes up from those many, many, in fact, millions of reports that are sent in, we look into that signal specifically with the kinds of studies that will determine, is this something that is actually related to the vaccine or not related to the vaccine?

VGS Thank you Kate for explaining that. Those were some of the questions that we knew people had about vaccines. If you have more questions, put that on our timelines and tell us if you want us to continue explaining clarifying any of your concerns about vaccines. Until next time then, stay safe, stay healthy and stick with science.