Weird question, could you take 2 Covid vaccines?

[USALiberal]

Would it cause any issues? Would it help at all?

[drray23]

1. the purpose of a vaccine is to stimulate your body

to produce antibodies when faced with covid. Taking both would not accomplish anything more than just one

[intrepidity]

24. Not necessarily true

it depends on the specific antigen being presented. And the method of presentation.

[BigmanPigman]

2. Don't some manufacturers alread have a two-dose vaccine approved?

There are three different manufacturers (I think, could be wrong) and I know one of them required two doses.

[drray23]

3. all of them do as far as I know.

All three being discussed require two doses.

[Blue_true]

11. All the three that have been announced require two doses.

China is vaccinating some people with a vaccine developed there, but little is known about that vaccine.

[Massacure]

25. There are actually four vaccines, one of which is a single dose

BioNTech, with assistance from Pfizer
Moderna
OxfordUniversity, with assistance from AstraZenica
Janssen Pharmaceutica, owned by Johnson and Johnson

The first two have completed their phase III clinical tries and have put in FDA requests with for emergency use authorizations. Both require two doses. The third and fourth are still in phase III clinical trials; Oxford's requires two doses and Janssen's requires a single.

[LisaL]

26. Oxford vaccine appears to be less effective than Pfizer's or Moderna's.

We don't know how effective Johnson & Johnson's vaccine is going to be.

[shanti]

4. Sure

I did it with Shingrix, I can do it with the Covid vaccine.

[dawg day]

10. I did two Shingles vaccines, but 2 years apart.

The first vaccine wasn't really effective, so when the better one came out, I got that too. No problems. (Of course, Covid might be different!)

The worry would be that the body would over-respond, produce too many antibodies-- auto-immune response. Literally no one knows. We do know that so far these three vaccines are (on their own) pretty effective so far, and not very risky.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

13. That second shingles vaccine requires two doses,

from 2 to 6 months apart. So if you only got one dose of that second one, you are not fully protected.

[shanti]

15. Exactly n/t

[shanti]

14. Yes

I had the first (ineffective) one, and then a couple of years later, got the 2 Shingrix shots. They were done ~3 months apart. My 42 year old son got shingles when he was about 35 or so, when he was on a Hawaiian vacation. He was so miserable that I swore I wouldn't let that happen!

[BigmanPigman]

19. I got mine in March right when Covid got going

and I thought I'd better get be prepared. It is a two shot vaccine and you are supposed to get the 2nd one within 6 months of the first. The first one made my arm hurt for a week but I'd rather have that than Shingles, same goes with Covid. I don't care about some side effects.

[smirkymonkey]

28. Same here.

Why not?

[PoliticAverse]

5. "Don't cross the streams". n/t

[PJMcK]

8. "It would be bad." (n/t)

[StClone]

6. Yes and even three

Redundancy may give a stronger and longer positive immune response, but may not a good trade-off for a limited resource.

[James48]

7. Note-

NONE of the vaccines are “approved”

One of the three says they have applied for “Emergency Use Authorization”(EUA), and the other two are expected to apply soon.

EUA does NOT carry the FDA’s approval saying it works and is safe. All the EuA does is say the FDA will wave qualification rules and let it be given- even though it doesn’t yet have enough data to be formally approved as both safe and effective.

That said- if you get TWO different vaccines soon, before everyone else does, you deprive someone else of their opportunity. I’ve been reading that supposedly there will be some 20 million doses produced in the first quarter of next year, IF it received EuA. That means 10 million people out of 330,000 Americans will be able to obtain their single (2 dose shot) vaccine, IF the distribution works perfectly, and IF those waiting as Health Care workers get their doses first. 320,000,000 won’t be getting anything for at least six months to a year from now. And I really can’t see industry being able to produce enough for all 330,000,000 Americans, AND the rest of the world, for several years yet.

Why would you even think about getting double?

(And we have to see exactly what mechanism is for each vaccine, AND whether anyone is going to do any studies on the benefits and risks of multiple vaccinations. Good grief! )

[USALiberal]

9. Thanks.....

I was not going to actually get two, just curious if taking two would help or hurt.

[StClone]

12. I think the provisio

Is that they are established safe, under standard guidelines, and as such would not have any more constraints than any current vaccine for viral agents (aka yearly flu shot). God help if your concerns are not heeded in a widespread vaccination program.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

16. My guess is that each one is formulated differently,

so it would not be a bright idea to get one from one company, and another from a different one.

What has not been made clear is the exact timing needed for the two doses. That's going to be huge. Just how much leeway is there?

With Shingrix, the shingles vaccine, the window of time for the second vaccine is any time between 2 and 6 months after the first one.

Somehow, I have a feeling that the Covid vaccines won't be as forgiving.

Something else that has just barely been mentioned is side effects. Apparently some of them have pretty severe side effects.

[intrepidity]

17. Do you mean, the same, or different?

If different, I suppose it might be beneficial.

The problem with not doing Phase2 trials is that dosing isn't as well worked out as otherwise (if you mean the same vaccine).

[USALiberal]

22. Different. Nt

[intrepidity]

27. I could imagine it being beneficial, with caveats

If they are entirely different approaches, eg, an mRNA-based vaccine, and an adenovirus-vector vaccine, and if the gap between them were sufficient to rule out interference, then I could imagine how getting both *might* be helpful. OTOH, eliciting *too strong* of an immune response carries it's own risks (cytokine storm, for one).

However, imagining it and actually testing it are two different things, which is, of course, why we have clinical trials...

[RockRaven]

18. I will take the first one that a) I'm even eligible to receive and b) goes through the normal

approval processes. If I have access to a second one which also had gone through the normal approval processes (and since I'm not in any special categories that would likely mean there's plenty to go around) before there is good head-to-head comparison data to say which one is better, I'd take that one too.

Once there is good head-to-head data, and assuming adequate supply of various options, I'd prefer to take the one which best reduces long-term consequences, hospitalization, and death. IDGAF about minor symptom prevention rates, by comparison.

[LSFL]

20. I am very cautious about anything that came from Warp Speed

The taint of Trump is upon it. I would try the original first vaccine long before I would trust anything related to Trump. I am likely wrong in this, but the timing of the announcement of the 2nd vaccine was a little too on the nose.

[carpetbagger]

21. I wouldn't get in line for 2 different, but if later data...

I am set to get one in about three weeks, and I'll get the second shot in January of that type. I don't know which one yet. If post-markerimg shows less immunity than hoped, I'll get the other once everyone's got the chance.

[USALiberal]

23. How did you get on list? Nt

[carpetbagger]

29. I work in a nursing home.

[BGBD]

30. Three reasons not to.

1: It's totally untested. We have no idea what mixing two of these vaccines might do. It could be totally safe, but it also might not be safe at all.

2: Supplies are limited. We have a lot of people in the country and the world to vaccinate, so using up multiple full courses on a single person means there is somebody out there who isn't going to get theirs as quickly as they should. That person could contract the virus and die in the time they are delayed in getting theirs, or pass it to someone else that dies.

3: It's not going to change that much. If a vaccine is 95% effective like they say these are, and you take another 95% effective vaccine on top of it, at best you have reduced your chance to getting COVID by just a little. You've taken your chances from 1 in 20 to 1 in 40. That's half the chance, but still a 2.5% chance of getting it vs a 5% chance. And that's only IF the vaccines stacked completely. It's more likely that there would be diminishing returns and the second vaccine would be far less effective than the first because the first had already provided most of the same protections as the other. Your body might already have all of the t-cells/antibodies created that it will and further vaccinations don't cause them to make any more.