Side effects of mRNA Covid-19 vaccines ‘are vanishingly rare’

Rare side-effects linked to the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines cannot be allowed to interfere with the national rollout, argue infectious disease experts

Infectious disease experts are warning that rare side effects linked to the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines cannot be allowed to interfere with the national rollout. Picture: AFP

Infectious disease experts are pleading that “vanishingly rare” side-effects linked to Moderna and Pfizer vaccines not be allowed to scupper the national rollout, despite a sustained campaign of misinformation from Australia’s anti-vaccination movement. On Tuesday, after anti-vaxxers wrongly attributed the death of an 18-year-old schoolboy to the Pfizer vaccine, the Therapeutic Goods Administration issued a statement confirming there had been no reports of death occurring after vaccination in any individual aged 18 years or under in Australia.

The main vaccine-related risks to people aged under 30 – detected mostly in young males – is myocarditis or pericarditis, two types of heart inflammation that have been linked to the mRNA vaccines made by Pfizer and Moderna.

However, after extensive investigation, regulators across the world have insisted the side effects remain extremely rare.

In June, the US Food and Drug Administration added a warning label to the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines after detecting rare cases of myocarditis or pericarditis in people aged 12-39, adding that Covid-19 presented a much greater threat of heart complications than vaccine-related side effects.

ANU infectious diseases expert Peter Collignon said the extremely rare side effects could not be allowed to destabilise Australia’s national rollout.

“Covid-19 can kill people in their 30s and younger and that is, in some respect, cardiac in origin, so it is illogical you would not get the vaccine because of these vanishingly rare cases, especially if you have an underlying health condition.”