First off - I’m not taking the vaccine. Everyone had their own right/decision to make, but me and my family won’t until there are longer studies, at scale, on long term effects.
Secondly, and my main question if anyone can explain it in a “simple manner” how do these mRNa vaccines work? My understanding is unlike other vaccines where you get a dead or live version of the disease, so your body recognizes it and responds appropriately, the mRNA basically sends a message, via proteins/genetic material to tell our body how to build up an immunity to fight the particular strain of virus?
So instead of “typical” vaccine where we learn via experience, mRNA is telling us when we encounter it how to fight it?
I’m genuinely curious as I’ve heard some people saying mRNA alters DNA, has less approval, isn’t as safe, etc.
This is not completely correct but it's pretty close.
The mRNA in the vaccine does not interact with DNA. Instead, it's delivered to the cells cytoplasm where host ribosomes (think protein factories) directly translate that mRNA into viral proteins. These viral proteins have a number of fates, including being secreted outside of the cell or being transported to the cell surface. This essentially boils down to our own cells "presenting" viral particles to our immune system.
Whether these are safe in the long-term has yet to be demonstrated. Preliminary data suggest that these vaccines can cause immune reactions, but you can look at the numbers and you'll see that very few of the people who received their first dose experienced a serious side effect. So it seems these are well tolerated in the short-term, but we'll have to wait for more data in the long-term.
That all said, in my opinion there's no reason to receive a vaccine for a virus with a 99.9% survival rate and no long-term morbidity or mortality for the average healthy person.
so just the one sided strip of the instruction set? i was trying to make it brief lol
Yes exactly. No worries about the brevity; you were pretty close actually.
The basic function of the cell is (called the central dogma of biology) is:
DNA -> mRNA -> Proteins.
We're skipping the DNA step and starting with mRNA.
yeah yeah but after doesnt it leave residual effects which i assumed to be rewiring/rewriting the overall code which i thought was DNA