1. Do I need to be vaccinated against COVID-19?

Vaccination has two important meanings. 

The first is the protection of individuals. After vaccination, the chance of contracting COVID-19 will be greatly reduced. The second is the protection of the entire population. After the majority is vaccinated, herd immunity can be formed, which prevents COVID-19 from spreading in the population until it disappears.

Therefore, it is recommended to vaccinate when conditions permit. The preventive effect of the vaccine will protect everyone in some extent.

2. What are the side effects of COVID-19 vaccine?

At present, the large-scale COVID-19 vaccines on the market in China are all inactivated vaccines. Inactivated vaccine is a traditional vaccine technology, and many vaccines are provided in the form of inactivation. In this circumstance, the production process is relatively mature, and the side effects are similar to those of other traditional vaccines, most of which are soreness, redness, pain, and itching at the injection site. Very few people may have fever, fatigue, nausea, headache, muscle aches, etc. due to individual differences. Side effects usually recover on their own after 2-3 days.

Other vaccines, such as Pfizer BioNtech and Moderna mRNA vaccines, use RNA nucleic acid vaccine technology. There is no precedent that has been listed before, but they have also undergone Phase III clinical trials. Most of its side effects are relatively mild, and a few serious side effects may be related to allergic reactions stimulated by components in the vaccine preparation.

Therefore, the launch of COVID-19 vaccine has been fully verified, and its side effects are controllable.

3. The protection of vaccines

The protective effect of any vaccine cannot reach 100%. According to the currently published data:

The protection rate of Kexing vaccine for slight disease and above is 50.38%; the protection rate for mild disease and above is 77.86%; and the protection rate for critical and severe diseases reaches 100% (data released by Brazil for Phase III clinical trials).

After Sinopharm vaccination, the positive conversion rate of neutralizing antibody was 99.52%. The vaccine's protective efficacy against diseases caused by COVID-19 infection is 79.34%.

The vaccine protection rates of Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna were 95% and 94.1% respectively.

A small number of people did not produce enough protection after vaccination, which is related to the characteristics of the vaccine itself and the personal physique of the recipient, mostly because it failed to produce enough neutralizing antibodies.

Therefore, vaccination does not mean complete safety. The necessary protective measures need to continue to be implemented.