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In the world’s most detailed data on how people feel after a Pfizer COVID vaccine, Israel found that less than 0.3% had side effects they felt were significant enough to be reported to doctors.
Ministry of Health officials who published the research believe it will bring peace of mind to many around the world who want to get a feel for the impact of the vaccine. They wrote that the side effects are “similar in frequency and character to symptoms reported after administration of other vaccines to the population.”
They also pointed out that side effects are normally ‘mild’ and ‘go away quickly’.
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After the first injection, 6,575 of 2,768,200 Israelis sought medical assistance for side effects, or 0.24%. The figure after the second shot was 0.26% – 3,592 of 1,377,827 recipients.
This latter figure indicates that while the second stroke is known to leave some people feeling under time, it rarely escalates into formal medical complaints.
Israelis at a vaccination center run by the Clalit Health Service in Petah Tikva, January 27, 2021. (Miriam Alster / Flash90)
Doctors responded enthusiastically to the data. “People around the world should feel reassured,” Yoav Yehezkeli, a doctor and public health expert at Tel Aviv University who was not involved in the study, told The Times of Israel.
Few of the complaints resulted in hospitalization – an average of 17 patients per million after the first injection and three patients per million after the second injection. Yehezkeli said doctors expected a few patients to have significant side effects and that he personally treated a patient who had partial facial nerve palsy after her second stroke, but said statistics show that the impact is low. Her patient has recovered.
This was the first major analysis of real-world side effects, involving multiple times the numbers involved in Pfizer’s clinical trials. Its results, which are accurate as of Jan. 27, match the expectations of healthcare organizations around the world based on the trial data.
The United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention noted before the vaccine became available that it can cause side effects that are normally “mild to moderate”, while “a small number of people have serious side effects. “.
The CDC expected the main side effects to be localized pain or broader symptoms like chills and headaches, which “might look like flu symptoms.” This is what Israeli data discovered.
A doctor in a protective suit and mask holds an injection syringe and a vaccine. (oshcherban via iStock by Getty Images)
The vast majority of complaints were either localized pain in the arm, or people generally feeling unwell. Arm pain accounted for 50% of first-shot complaints and 22% of second-shot complaints. Some 41% of first-shot complaints and 73% of second-shot complainants reported feeling generally unwell.
There were also more unusual side effects.
Neurological symptoms were reported by 287 first-dose vaccinees and 96 second-dose vaccinees. There have been 165 reports of allergic reactions, including anaphylaxis, after the first stroke and 47 after the second stroke. Other unusual side effects were reported by 60 and 19 people after the first and second injections, respectively.
Israel’s statistics should be considered reliable because the country’s health system involves “active monitoring” for side effects, Yehezkeli said. “These are important figures because many people in Israel have already been vaccinated and the health system is very organized with methods of reporting side effects,” he commented.
“I’m a doctor and every time I report a patient with, for example, a fever, who was recently vaccinated, the computer system generates an alert and asks if I want to report it as a side effect. This is what I call active surveillance. “
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