Grandparent scam: London, Ont., senior beats fraudsters not once, but twice
It was a typical Tuesday for Mabel Beharrell, 84, until she got the call that would turn her world upside down. Her teenaged grandson was in trouble and needed her help.
You may have heard the warning from a friend or a relative: “Don’t give your daughter the COVID-19 vaccine if you want grandchildren.”
Concerns about whether these vaccines will cause long-term fertility-related issues have rekindled as more children aged 12 and over are vaccinated in Canada and elsewhere, but experts say studies, along with time-tested scientific research around vaccines, show these claims are baseless.
In Canada, the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine was authorized in May for 12 to 15 year olds and Health Canada is currently reviewing Moderna’s application for those aged 12 to 17. Already, close to three million U.S. children between 12 and 17 have been vaccinated and clinical studies show the vaccines are safe and effective for that age group, says KidsHealthFirst.ca, an information portal for parents, caregivers, youth and health providers created by the Children’s COVID-19 Vaccine Advisory Table.
The Ontario-based group is made up of more than two dozen infectious disease, pediatric, and public health experts, among others, representing more than half a dozen eminent children’s health organizations including SickKids, the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario, and McMaster Children’s Hospital. The Canadian Paediatric Society also advocates for the COVID-19 vaccination of all children and adolescents aged 12 years and over.
The myth around infertility started when someone thought the spike protein created by the mRNA vaccine was similar to a protein found on the placenta called syncytin-1, said molecular and cellular biologist Dr. Krishana Sankar with COVID-19 Resources Canada.
The concerns were raised by a German physician and soon spread on social media.
“Basically, they were trying to say that because there were similarities … with syncytin-1, then we would create antibodies against syncytin-1, which means it would affect our fertility,” said Sankar, who is also the scientific liaison for an anti-misinformation campaign, ScienceUpFirst.
“That’s actually not true. For that to be true, syncytin-1 would need to be extremely, extremely similar to the spike proteins that we create for antibodies -- and it is not. The amount of similarity is very miniscule. So any antibodies that we generate in our bodies to the spike protein would not actually affect the protein on the placenta called syncytin-1.”
Johns Hopkins Medicine also describes the two spike proteins as “completely different.”
“It's like saying you and I both have the same social security number because they both contain the number five. So that was wrong to begin with,” said Dr. Paul Offit with the Vaccine Education Center at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia in a YouTube video debunking the claim.
The mRNA vaccines also can not alter your DNA and affect fertility that way either. Pediatrics and molecular virology professor, Dr. Peter Hotez with the National School of Tropical Medicine, told ABC News: “There’s no plausible mechanism by which that could occur.”
Misleading claims and opposition to the vaccine, especially for young adults and children, by controversial political advocacy groups including the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons and America’s Frontline Doctors, have also helped fuel misinformation around the vaccine’s safety.
The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG), the Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine (SMFM), and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) all say there is no evidence the vaccines will affect fertility.
In studies conducted on animals prior to its authorized use, the mRNA vaccines were found not to have an effect on fertility or cause problems with pregnancy.
Johns Hopkins also noted that during the Pfizer vaccine tests, 23 volunteers involved in the trials became pregnant and the only one who suffered a miscarriage had actually received the placebo, not the mRNA vaccine.
Sankar said participants in the clinical trials were told not to get pregnant, but some inadvertently did anyway and carried their babies to term.
“We have data from real world evidence that suggest the vaccine would not affect pregnancy or fertility,” she said.
In his YouTube video, Offit also pointed to two clinical trials that were conducted on the mRNA vaccines where a similar number of women became pregnant in the vaccine group and the placebo group.
“Now, if it was true that this vaccine or these vaccines affected fertility, then there should have been more pregnancies in the placebo group than in the vaccine group, but that wasn't true...the vaccine didn't enhance fertility and it didn't negatively affect fertility,” Offit said.
Some of the renewed concerns with children involve worries about the lasting effects of the COVID-19 vaccines on fertility.
“The vaccine itself is not going to do anything. It goes into a body very temporarily to just basically ignite or elicit an immune response, and our body’s the one that then takes over and does all the work,” said Sankar.
She explains that the components within a vaccine do not stick around for long. The mRNA for example, degrades extremely quickly. These vaccines “teach” our cells to make the spike proteins that will trigger an immune response. Once the proteins are created, the mRNA “instructions” break down and are discarded. Sankar says they are typically gone within 48 to 72 hours. Nothing accumulates in any organ.
“The vaccine and even the memory cells and antibodies don’t stick around forever at all,” she added, explaining that is why many vaccines require booster shots.
To be clear, all the normal regulatory requirements and steps to develop a vaccine took place, including the clinical trials and number of participants normally required, SickKids says on its website. A key reason why researchers were able to complete everything so quickly was due to the large number of COVID-19 cases in the trials, how quickly they were able to get volunteers, and the enormous amount of financial, staffing, and technical resources that were quickly made available due to the urgency of the pandemic. These are all elements that would normally take much longer to come together in a pre-pandemic environment.
Even with that urgency, Sankar also pointed to a wealth of historical data and decades of scientific research and expertise around vaccines in general that also served as an useful template for what scientists may or may not expect.
“It’s important for people to realize that science and research has been going on for many, many years. You’re only now in a pandemic, so everything is new. but just because we are studying something that is new now, it doesn’t mean that we don’t have the tools and research from years of experience,” she said.
“For many of the vaccines that have been administered to children, there hasn’t been any evidence to suggest there was any kind of effect on the fertility of girls or young people who would want to eventually become pregnant.”
It was a typical Tuesday for Mabel Beharrell, 84, until she got the call that would turn her world upside down. Her teenaged grandson was in trouble and needed her help.
The deaths of four people on a farm near the Saskatchewan village of Neudorf have been confirmed a murder-suicide.
The Canada Revenue Agency announced Thursday it will not require 'bare trust' reporting from Canadians that it introduced for the 2024 tax season, just four days before the April 2 deadline.
The Parole Board of Canada has granted full parole to one of three men convicted in the brutal murders of three McDonald's restaurant workers in Cape Breton more than 30 years ago.
Calgary police shut down a number of bridges into and out of the downtown core as officers dealt with a distraught individual. The incident lasted almost 20 hours.
Ontario released its annual sunshine list Thursday afternoon, noting that the largest year-over-year increases were in hospitals, municipalities, and post-secondary sectors.
Genetic analysis has shed light on a long-standing mystery surrounding the fates of U.S. President George Washington's younger brother Samuel and his kin.
A spokesman for a regional Muslim advocacy group says Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre's stance on the Israel-Hamas war could complicate his party's relationship with Muslim Canadians.
Former U.S. President Donald Trump is officially selling a copy of the Bible themed to Lee Greenwood’s famous song, 'God Bless the USA.' But the concept of a Bible covered in the American flag has raised concern among religious circles.
B.C. conservation officers recently seized a nine-foot-long Burmese python from a home in Chilliwack.
A New Brunswicker will go to bed Thursday night much richer than he was Wednesday after collecting on a winning lottery ticket he let sit on his bedroom dresser for nearly a year.
The Ontario government is introducing changes to auto-insurance, but some experts say the move is ill-advised.
A Toronto restaurant introduced a surprising new rule that reduced the cost of a meal and raised the salaries of staff.
Newfoundland’s unique version of the Pine Marten has grown out of its threatened designation.
A Toronto man is out $12,000 after falling victim to a deepfake cryptocurrency scam that appeared to involve Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
It started small with a little pop tab collection to simply raise some money for charity and help someone — but it didn’t take long for word to get out that 10-year-old Jace Weber from Mildmay, Ont. was quickly building up a large supply of aluminum pop tabs.
There’s a group of people in Saskatoon that proudly call themselves dumpster divers, and they’re turning the city’s trash into treasure.
Ontario is facing a larger than anticipated deficit but the Doug Ford government still plans to balance its books before the next provincial election.