Comparison of adverse events between COVID-19 and Flu vaccines

  1. Prajwal Mani Pradhan
  2. Zhoutian Shen
  3. Changye Li
  4. Michael J. Remucal

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Abstract

BACKGROUND

Among the various driving factors for vaccine hesitancy, confidence in the safety associated with the vaccine constitutes as one of the key factors. This study aimed at comparing the adverse effects of COVID-19 vaccines with the Flu vaccines.

METHODS

The VAERS data from 01/01/2020 to 08/20/2021 were used. The MedDRA terms coded by VAERS were further aggregated by a clinician into clinically meaningful broader terms.

RESULTS

Various common adverse events between Flu and COVID-19 vaccines have been identified. Adverse events such as headache and fever were very common across all age groups. Among the common adverse events between Flu and COVID-19 vaccine, the relative risk along with 95% CI indicated that such common adverse events were more likely to be experienced by COVID-19 vaccine users than Flu vaccine users. Our study also quantified the proportion of rare adverse events such as Guillain Barre Syndrome and Gynecological changes in the VAERS database for COVID-19 vaccines.

CONCLUSIONS

Based on the available data and results, it appears that there were some common adverse events between Flu vaccines and COVID-19 vaccines. These identified common adverse events warrant further investigations based on the relative risk and 95% CI.

Article activity feed

  1. Rapid Reviews Infectious Diseases

    Ashwin Kamath

    Review 2: "Comparison of adverse events between COVID-19 and Flu Vaccines"

    Preprint presents analysis of COVID-19 & flu vaccine-related adverse events using VAERS. Reviewers found results potentially informative in showing effects of the vaccines, but there are limitations to the dataset, the study has flawed methods, and findings are not actionable.

  2. Rapid Reviews Infectious Diseases

    Lili Zhao

    Review 1: "Comparison of adverse events between COVID-19 and Flu vaccines"

    Preprint presents analysis of COVID-19 & flu vaccine-related adverse events using VAERS. Reviewers found results potentially informative in showing effects of the vaccines, but there are limitations to the dataset, the study has flawed methods, and findings are not actionable.

  4. ScreenIT

    SciScore for 10.1101/2021.09.22.21263711: (What is this?)

    Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.

    Table 1: Rigor

    Ethicsnot detected.
    Sex as a biological variablenot detected.
    Randomizationnot detected.
    Blindingnot detected.
    Power Analysisnot detected.

    Table 2: Resources

    Software and Algorithms
    SentencesResources
    Data preprocessing and descriptive analyses were conducted using R version 4.0.2, running in RStudio Version 1.2.5033.
    RStudio
    suggested: (RStudio, RRID:SCR_000432)

    Results from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).

    Results from LimitationRecognizer: We detected the following sentences addressing limitations in the study:
    As mentioned previously, the interpretation of the results is subjected to limitations of passive surveillance system. Moderna had the highest number of reports in VAERS among all cohorts. Most of the reports were from the 31-64 age group which is likely due to the initial authorization of vaccine for the 31-64 age group. The proportion of reports were equally divided among having recovered and not recovered from the adverse event across all cohorts. The proportion of death across COVID vaccines cohorts were comparable and may indicate the high fatality rate of the disease rather than the vaccines especially given that the COVID-19 vaccines were recently introduced and those with severe symptoms had earlier access to them than the general population. Across the five cohorts and age groups, common adverse events could be summarized as: central neuropathy, fever, headache, injection site, nonspecific musculoskeletal pain, chest pain. Except for chest pain, most of the adverse events were already identified in randomized controlled clinical trials of COVID-19 vaccines. Our study provides an age-wise distribution of adverse events as reported in the VAERS database (Table 2). It is hoped that this information will assist some in overcoming their vaccine hesitancy due to safety concerns. Investigating rare side effects of any vaccine is a difficult task[28] due to the rarity of some side-effects, the longer period of manifestation for some side-effects, and lack of evidence for cau...

    Results from TrialIdentifier: No clinical trial numbers were referenced.

    Results from Barzooka: We did not find any issues relating to the usage of bar graphs.

    Results from JetFighter: We did not find any issues relating to colormaps.

    Results from rtransparent:
    • Thank you for including a conflict of interest statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • Thank you for including a funding statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • No protocol registration statement was detected.

    Results from scite Reference Check: We found no unreliable references.

    About SciScore

    SciScore is an automated tool that is designed to assist expert reviewers by finding and presenting formulaic information scattered throughout a paper in a standard, easy to digest format. SciScore checks for the presence and correctness of RRIDs (research resource identifiers), and for rigor criteria such as sex and investigator blinding. For details on the theoretical underpinning of rigor criteria and the tools shown here, including references cited, please follow this link.

  5. Version published to 10.1101/2021.09.22.21263711v1 on medRxiv