London: This can easily qualify for an entry into Ripley’s Believe It Or Not!
A 62-year-old man from Magdeburg in Germany claimed to have received over 200 COVID-19 vaccine shots of different companies.
The revelation has set researchers thinking, and the man’s bizarre act has become the subject of a scientific study.
What scientists were primarily interested in is the man’s immune response to so many vaccine shots, where the maximum doses any country offered its citizens is 4.
The analysis, published in Lancet Infectious Diseases journal, looks at the effects of repeated vaccinations on a human being’s immunity.
Even after receiving 217 doses, as claimed by the man, he appears to be generating antibodies and enhancing protection from the vaccines.
On coming to know about the man’s claims, doctors at Friedrich-Alexander-Universitat Erlangen-Nurnberg and hospitals in Munich and Vienna contacted him.
“We learned about his case via newspaper articles. We then contacted him and invited him to undergo various tests in Erlangen. He was very interested in doing so,” stated Privatdozent Dr Kilian Schober from Institute of Microbiology-Clinical Microbiology, Immunology, and Hygiene (director Proffessor Dr Christian Bogdan).
Schober and his team sought to find out the consequences of hypervaccination like this would have and how it alters immune response?
All vaccines contain parts of the pathogen or a type of construction plan which the vaccinated person’s cells can use to produce these pathogenic components themselves.
These antigens help the immune system recognise the real pathogen if there is another infection later. In such a scenario, it can react more rapidly and forcibly.
But what happens if the immune system is exposed often to a specific antigen?
“That may be the case in a chronic infection such as HIV or Hepatitis B, that has regular flare-ups. There is an indication that certain types of immune cells, known as T-cells, then become fatigued, leading to them releasing fewer pro-inflammatory messenger substances,” explained Schober.
Such effects, triggered by the cells becoming used to antigens, can weaken the immune system, which no longer is able to combat the pathogen effectively.
The study does not give any indication that this is the case.
“The individual has undergone various blood tests over recent years. He gave us his permission to assess the results of these analyses. In some cases, samples had been frozen, and we were able to investigate these ourselves. We were also able to take blood samples ourselves when the man received a further vaccination during the study at his own insistence. We were able to use these samples to determine exactly how the immune system reacts to the vaccination,” said Schober.
As per the results, the hyper-vaccinated man has a large number of T-effector cells against SARS-CoV-2, which act as the body’s soldiers to fight against the virus.
The person had more of T-effector cells than the control group of people who received three doses of vaccine. No fatigue in these effector cells were seen by researchers, in fact they were as effective as those in the control group who had taken normal number of vaccination.
