June 24, 2021- 9:05 p.m.
Coronavirus vaccines are likely linked to “incredibly rare” cases of heart inflammation, but the risk of side effects are “vastly outweighed” by the vaccine’s benefits, doctors said after a CDC investigation of post-vaccination heart inflammation.
Cases of heart inflammation — myocarditis and pericarditis — are much more common as a result of getting COVID-19 than from receiving an mRNA vaccine, the doctors added. Red Sox pitcher Eduardo Rodriguez, for instance, last year developed myocarditis after he was diagnosed with COVID-19.
The CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices this week reported 1,226 cases of myocarditis and pericarditis after about 300 million doses of the two-shot mRNA vaccines have been administered in the U.S.
More than 177 million people across the country have received at least one dose. There have been 12.6 heart inflammation cases per million vax doses in the U.S.
Post-vaccination heart inflammation cases have occurred mostly in male adolescents and young adults who are 16 or older, more often after getting the second dose than after the first dose, and typically within several days after vaccination.
“Although instances of heart inflammation are incredibly rare — the CDC reports 389 cases of myocarditis or pericarditis in 12- to 24-year-olds, while nearly 21 million people in this age group have received a COVID-19 vaccine — the issue warranted and received rigorous scientific study,” the presidents of the Massachusetts Medical Society and Massachusetts Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics said Thursday.
“After review of the latest information available, it was clear that the benefits of vaccination in this age group far outweigh the small risk of this very rare side effect,” they added. “For those who do experience inflammation of the heart or surrounding tissue, most cases are mild, and recovery is short and often with minimal or no treatment. The risk to the heart from COVID-19 infection itself is far greater.”
