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Michelle has gone all in on TikTok—not just for fun, mind you, but because certain medical professionals have turned it into a surprisingly engaging resource for both other people in their field as well as the average layperson. This week, she invited the people behind three of her favorite accounts to discuss how they educate about COVID and vaccination while trying to tamp down on the myriad falsehoods surrounding those very touchy subjects.
Tyler (@thatsassynp on TikTok) is a pulmonary nurse practitioner who does both in- and out-patient work and who previously worked in the ICU as a registered nurse; over the last couple of years he’s become very interested in vaccines, how they work, and the disinformation surrounding them. Savannah (@rx0rcist) is an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant (IBCLC) who left her previous role as a retail pharmacist and discovered a massive need for evidence-based medicine in the process. Christina (@christinaaaaaaanp) is a nurse practitioner with an oncological focus who saw TikTok as an opportune platform to combat the myths surrounding COVID.
In this episode, our guests lay out how mNRA vaccines are a “plug-and-play technology,” debunk some key anti-vaccination talking points, and explain why there are new variants of COVID-19.
EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS:
Interview starts: 8:37
– What kind of work goes into making their educational TikToks?
– Who makes up the guests’ collective audiences on TikTok?
– How a “dumpster fire” can easily develop in the comments beneath even the most innocuous videos.
– Why these vaccines have NOT been rushed.
– The difference between “traditional” and mRNA vaccines.”
– Why Savannah finds the vaccine and certain people’s response to it to be so fascinating.
– The reason you should worry about being vaccinated if you’re pregnant or breastfeeding.
– The country whose vaccine rollout Tyler has been keeping a close eye on.
– Why you still need to get the vaccine even if you’ve had COVID.
QUOTES:
“It’s a human thing and a social media problem.”
“When you have a technology that’s been worked on for decades and you have this lovely pandemic to work with, it’s just like a recipe for perfection to establish and make a vaccine.”
“Instead of saying ‘Oh my god, why is it rushed?!’ it’s like ‘Oh my god, why have we never put this much energy and time into making vaccines?!’”
“It’s really promising for the future as well for mNRA technology and how it’s gonna be applied to future vaccines and how quickly we’re going to be able to get vaccines when the next pandemic hits us.”
“These committees don’t take this lightly at all.”
“Almost all clinical studies will have pregnancy as an exclusion criteria.”
“It’s a pandemic, not a light switch; we don’t just turn it off.”
“We’ve been at this for a year. We can keep doing this with some hope at the end.”
“You have to have a strong voice and you’ve gotta keep speaking.”
LINKS:
Tyler on TikTok – https://www.tiktok.com/@thatsassynp
Savannah on TikTok – https://www.tiktok.com/@rx0rcist
Christina on TikTok – https://www.tiktok.com/@christinaaaaaaanp
A Tale of Two Hygienists homepage – https://ataleoftwohygienists.com/
AToTH on Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/aTaleOfTwoHygienists/
AToTH on Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/ataleoftwohygienists
AToTH on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/company/atoth/?originalSubdomain=ca
This episode has been transcribed for your viewing pleasure!
Opening Quote 1:
“I think our job is to bridge our excitement with these people who are scared so that everybody can have a shared love of science, because that is honestly, I know I speak for my two friends, that that’s honestly my favorite thing is science. I love science.”
Opening Quote 2:
” We have to keep an open mind. We’re in a pandemic. This is an unprecedented world issue. We’re trying to vaccinate as many people as we can and we just can’t, you know, immediate gratification, right. like, we just have to let that go for a little bit. We’ve been at this for a year. We can keep doing this with some hope at the end. It’s a light at the end of the tunnel. That’s how I kind of look at it.”
Opening Quote 3:
” So the thing is that pretty much every vaccine up until this point does reduce transmission or infection. So it is fully expected that these vaccines are going to as well. But like Tyler said, we are an evidence based community. We’re not just going to say something without data to back it up. And until we get that data, we can’t be for sure.”
Podcast Intro:
Get ready for your Unofficial Dental Hygiene podcast. These are the tales of two hygienists, one East Coast, hygienists and one West Coast guygienist. Listen as they tackle the profession of dental hygiene with humor and enthusiasm. Now please join Michelle Strange and Andrew Johnston as they tell you A Tale of Two Hygienists.
Andrew:
Welcome back, everyone, to another episode of A Tale of Two Hygienists, Episode 266, my name is Andrew
Michelle:
And this is Michelle, and we are excited you are here for this episode! And any of the episodes and, you know, hit subscribe while you’re here! If you’re here for this episode, just hit subscribe because we’ve got good ones. I promise.
Andrew:
That’s good. All of them are good, all of them are timely when they aired, but still go back and listen to them because they’re all really good. but this one is really timely though. This one is perfect for our situation.
Michelle:
Yeah, I’m really excited! We’re talking all things covid vaccine and answering a lot of questions that I’ve seen over and over and over and over again in these social forums. I personally thought I’d tell you a little bit about my little situation with the vaccine, because I signed up way back when before Moderna and Pfizer, like, said, “hey, we got this vaccine and is ready and we can start doing it.” And all of us were like whaaat. I signed up for the AstraZeneca trial, and so I have been doing that. I’ve been in a double blind trial. And so that’s been quite the experience, which I. Have you ever done any studies?
Andrew:
Never.
Michelle:
I did a lot as a hygiene student. I was like, “oh, I get paid for this stuff…Sure! What do you want to sign me up for?”
Andrew:
OK, so explain the process to me, because I mean, I understand what a double blind study is, but how do you get involved with one… tell me more.
Michelle:
I randomly got involved because I saw in an email I get every day about my area like Charleston area and MUSC, which is our medical university actually had an ad out for that. So I’ve seen ads back in the day before we had digital everything, I actually saw them in our local paper that you get. I mean, you can just about find anything… Nicotine drugs, like and I did a lot of sinus issue, like sinus medication sprays. We’ve all heard about my crazy surgery that I had in 2019 and so I’ve had gastro concerns and issues for years, so I signed up for all the endoscopies, all the studies on that, and of course nothing ever came from it because no one found out that my colon wasn’t attached anything… but I signed up for all of those with the hopes of like A) I would get paid and B) also find out what was wrong with me. So I’ve done studies. I hadn’t done it and probably a solid decade. So I was like, you know what, I’m going to do it. I am going to do this. I, I believe in them. And so why not contribute to science in this way?
Andrew:
So OK, so there is a possibility, though, that you weren’t given the vaccine at all.
Michelle:
Yeah. So I signed up. I had to go through the intake to make sure that I could fit into whatever, you know, I don’t have any preexisting conditions, all the stuff I don’t plan on getting pregnant any time soon. All that jazz, and then got there. And lots of questionnaires, lots of consent forms, for females you have to do a pregnancy test, blood work. I had a covid test, but they don’t run it, which I found interesting. It was if I were I was showing signs like if I got sick, they would run that to see if I was positive or negative at the time I got the first shot. So they have that. I mean, I kind of did it also because if I show signs of covid, I have this like hotline and I get like immediate care. It seemed like a real win win for me just incase.So, yeah, blood work, all of that jazz and then a double blind means that like I don’t know what I got in the person giving me it doesn’t know what I got. So I suspect that I am in the placebo group because I’ve had both shots with NOTHING, not even a sore arm. And I know my big joke is like I inject my face with Botox, I’m like, A-OK with needles, so maybe this was just it like maybe I’ve just built up a tolerance for pain.
Andrew:
Or that your Hulk muscles over here are just like so awesome that there’s no pain.
Michelle:
My body’s like a needle that’s like every three months for us. So when I went and got my second shot, I was told that I could be unblinded in the situation now. Which I was very excited about. This, was one of those things where I was like, oh, that does suck a little bit about being in the study. I wouldn’t have known for two years if I got the vaccine or not. And when Pfizer, and Moderna came out with theirs and they were giving it to all health care workers, now I can show that I can actually get the vaccine of Moderna are Pfizer and then I just send them this information and they’ll unblind me from the study. And if I got the vaccine, then I’m probably not going to go get the vaccine for obviously reasons, obviously I don’t want to two vaccines, but if I got the placebo, that does allow me to go do it (get vaccinated), which is great since I am still seeing patients, but also I don’t go out and see the world except for when I see patients.
Andrew:
Right. Right. You’re a little recluse over there.
Michelle:
Yeah. So that’s what I’ve been doing with the vaccine, which it’s been an interesting whole situation, seeing everybody get their vaccine cards and everything. I’m over going, oh, I think I got mine… I want to celebrate, but I’m really excited that I did the trial nonetheless.
Andrew:
Did you post that you got like that little card? You don’t get a card, do you?
Michelle:
I don’t because I don’t know if I got it.
Andrew:
Well, you posted yourself pictures of you at the facility getting it?
Michelle:
Yeah, I did some TikToks!
Andrew:
Of course you did. Oh my gosh. You and your TikToks.
Michelle:
Well, that actually is a great Segway into our episode today because we have some people on that I found on TikTok! And Listen, I know social media is a dumpster fire most of the time. It’s where the garbage lives, truly. But if you can use it wisely there are some beautiful things that happen on social media and I have learned so, so, SO much from some brilliant people on there. And we have some of those people on today. So I’m really excited to kick it to the epsiode. Y’all enjoy this episode.
Andrew:
Before we get to the interview, we want to say a big thank you to Paradise Dental Technologies, or PDT, for supporting the continuing education portion of this podcast for so many years. If you do not know already many of our full length episodes count for CE, you’ll find the links in the show notes, or you can sign up for our newsletter by going to www.ataleoftwohygienists.com. When you sign up for the newsletter, we will periodically send out links to shows that have expiring CE courses attached and none of this could be possible without the support of the amazing people over at PDT. So check out their hygiene and other instruments at www.pdtdental.com Now onto the interview.
Michelle:
Well, everyone, welcome to the interview portion of the podcast. You know, it’s so funny because everybody’s come up to us through the years and are like “oh, we’re like fans, girling fanboying over you and Andrew. And I’m in a real moment of TikTok fandom. I have three of my favorite ones that I have learned so much from. So I just want to say that, thank you guys so much for your amazing content and tackling some, shouldn’t be hard hitting things, but it is! So I want to let each one of you introduce yourselves. Tyler’s first on my screen. So, Tyler, take it away.
Tyler:
Well, first of all, Michelle, thanks for having all of us. This is exciting. And I’m glad that you enjoy my TikTok content. It was kind of a random thing for me to even start that six months ago, but I am a pulmonary nurse practitioner. I mainly do outpatient pulmonary work in my in a clinic and then I do some inpatient work as well. My background is an ICU registered nurse and over the last several years I have become particularly interested in vaccine and vaccine related misinformation, which is why I’ve really gone into the whole covid thing, particularly the covid vaccine so that’s kind of how this has all been born out for me.
Michelle:
Nice, nice. And then I have Savannah next.
Savannah:
I am Savannah, I am a pharmacist and an IBCLC as of last month, which is really exciting. I left my traditional role as a pharmacist in retail in 2019 after my daughter was born and wanted to kind of seek a nontraditional route in pharmacy and found my passion in lactation consulting and it also allowed me to spend time with my daughter. In consulting I found a huge need for evidence based medicine because for some reason when you roll with the breastfeeding community, you have tons of people who do not vaccinate, who do not know what evidence based medicine even is. So through this pandemic, it’s been really easy for me to transition into a more educating role, given that I’m already educating with lactation support. So it’s been, to echo what Tyler has said, it’s been kind of an easy transition with with TikTok
Michelle:
Nice and Christina?
Christina:
Hey, so I’m Christina. I’m a nurse practitioner in Boston. I work in oncology. My background is a pretty strong science background, biochemistry background and working in labs for several years before I became a nurse and like the other two folks have said, I have always been passionate about teaching and educating, and I teach regularly in my hospital and with other sort of groups outside of the hospital. So when TikTok came around and this opportunity to combat misinformation that was running rampant about covid, it really kind of felt like a natural sort of transition to use this platform to try to educate and try to debunk, like Savannah and Tyler do, too. So it’s great. I have a lot of fun doing it!
Michelle:
Yeah. I mean, you guys make really fun content, too. I’m curious how many how much time do you spend? As a content creator, it is exhausting … and you guys produce a lot of content. Are you really kind of answering things that is in your wheelhouse? Or are you doing research ahead of time? And how much time does it take to edit and do all that stuff?
Christina:
So I think for me, you know, obviously we’re all working people here and it does take a bit of time, you know, and I think there definitely have been moments where for myself I’d have to take time off from TikTok from either because of just sort of the mental burden of it, the physical time that I just couldn’t commit to it anymore. It’s hard to say exactly how much time I spend per week, but I’d say per day, I do try to put out like a video a day. I do often read literature ahead of time things in medical journals or recent publications, just so I’m up to speed on the data that I’m presenting. But, you know, recording videos doesn’t take very long in and of itself if you kind of know what you’re going to talk about. So, yeah, I it doesn’t take too long actually, I think I spend more time responding to, like, comments and stuff.
Tyler:
Ya I’ll echo that. I mean, it’s random for me. I have days that I’m just like really busy at work, so I don’t have a lot of time to do that. But I typically plan a lot of my content out. So I think about things I want to talk about. I’ll even record some of it, like, you know, days before I post it, for example. And then sometimes it’s just responding to comments. And so those are like fly by the seat of your pants and just like go with the flow on that. So I think, yeah, it’s definitely depends on what’s in the news, too, and what the new conspiracy theory we might have been told about is or the new misinformation flying around. So it’s kind of like a roller coaster. It’s very variable.
Savannah:
I mean, I guess I do spend some time like planning a little bit, but it’s usually, like Tyler said, it’s usually just flying by the seat of my pants. My personality type is that I’m really motivated in the moment. And then if too much time has passed, like if more than twenty four hours has passed, that I was thinking about responding to something or something I saw on the news, I lose interest and I just move on. And usually by that time one of my friends have already responded to it. The times that I do spend a lot of mental energy planning things and like writing things out and researching, I get really invested in it emotionally. So that usually takes a toll on my mental health, which to echo what Christina said, we do definitely have to take breaks from content making when it gets a little bit too much.
Andrew:
You know, I have to ask for your audience base, do you feel like there’s a lot of medical professionals or is it mostly average Joe citizen?
Savannah:
Honestly, I think it’s a good mix of both. I’m sure there are content creators who really pay attention to their analytics. I don’t know what that means. I know that there’s times that it’s like good to post certain content based on who is active online. I think it’s a little bit skewed because I do tend to communicate more with my friends on the app, which happened to be other health care professionals. But I do get a healthy, healthy dose of random people that don’t have medical backgrounds asking questions. So I don’t know basically is the answer to that question. Has the answer to that question.
Christina:
Yeah, I would agree. I feel like a lot of our mutual people, so people that I follow and they follow us back or, you know, vice versa. Those folks are often healthcare professionals or somebody in a scientific field. But yeah, I think a large number of our followers are probably non-science, non-medical people and just maybe follow for information, because they are the type of laypeople that really seek real data, real evidence, real information, and they value it. And we appreciate that. We always appreciate any layperson who understands the value of, you know, legitimate science that goes behind sort of recommendations for covid, for example. So, yeah, I’d say it’s probably a majority nonmedical, I would think.
Tyler:
Yeah, I’ve looked into that myself because I try to I mean, we all try to connect with our followers, which can be daunting at times. Just because sometimes there are sometimes so many comments on a post you make but I think it’s a good mix. I think in addition to a lot of health care professionals that follow me, there’s a lot of health care professional students. So like a lot of nursing students, even medical students, RT students. You know, you see them pop up in the comments. And then I think there’s a lot of general public as well that are just genuinely interested in something that you posted. And, you know, I think that we all have our kind of core followers, like the same kind of people that leave comments and engage with your content, and I would say the majority of those people, it’s a good mix of health care and non health care. So it’s good to actually see that mix because it gets everybody talking, you know, students, non health care people, health care people. So I just think it’s kind of a really good, healthy mix.
Christina:
Ya and I think to add on to that, I think there are probably more than I ever appreciated a lot of what I call lurkers on TikTok, you know, they have their accounts. They don’t make content. All they do is just follow people and just follow content and maybe like, but never comment. So I think there’s a lot of these sort of invisible followers that we have. We don’t know what their views are or their opinions. So I imagine that a lot of our followers actually fall in that category.
Michelle:
Yeah, I think I fell in that category for a while on TikTok. So our audience is mostly dental professionals, heavy in the dental hygiene world. And I became very disheartened with my profession last year, as I’m sure a lot of us have with people just not understanding science and just pushing misinformation. And I’m working on finding my empathy because I think some of it comes from fear. But also I’m like y’all graduated with science degrees and understanding the scientific method is just kind of important!
So I I wanted to have this conversation around the vaccine because I don’t know. Andrew you don’t spend as much time lurking in the Facebook groups as I do, maybe. But I feel like maybe it’s like 50/50 with people who want to get the vaccine and who don’t want to get the vaccine.
Andrew:
I think you’re right, but we don’t know what the lurkers are thinking. I think Christina nailed that part. Right. The vocal people are probably 50/50, but the people behind the scenes, we really have no idea, except for I guess we do have some of those those polls and stuff that have been kind of going up.
Michelle:
There’s definitely a line drawn in the sand in our profession among dental hygienist and it’s intense, and as if we weren’t already battling each other on other topics in 2020. Now we have the vaccine where everybody’s like posting if they got it, posting if they don’t and then shaming either way. Right. I mean do you guys see that in yours?
Andrew:
It is an interesting profession. I know a little behind the scenes by the way, into dental hygiene. That it is a little interesting profession.
Michelle:
We are a very special niche of healthcare or a mess.
Tyler:
We could say the same for nursing.
Savannah:
Pharmacy as well. I follow a lot of pharmacy pages and it’s the same deal that somebody will post something like “I just got my Pfizer vaccine. I have this, this and this. Did anybody else experience this?” And you’ll have a lot of people supportive and then a couple of people will come in and say, something like, “I can’t believe you got this vaccine. It’s not been researched enough.” And then it just turns into a dumpster fire and then the post has to be shut down.
Michelle:
haha OK, so just insert dental hygienist into that.
Tyler:
It’s a human thing, and a social media problem.
Michelle:
Yeah. So true. So true. So I would love to talk about what you just kind of spoke to a little bit Savannah is the thought of this being a rushed vaccine without enough trials, not enough data like give it to us straight about these vaccines.
Christina:
I feel like all of us have so much to say about this. I think what we would just want to scream is that it hasn’t been rushed. Part of the issue is that emerging technology is not new. It’s been around. And yes, this is the first in human approved vaccine available, but it isn’t the first MRNA vaccine by any means. And it’s been tested in humans, in other forms for other diseases, and it’s been shown to be safe and effective. So it’s not new technology. I’m involved in clinical trials, in my work. So I’m very sort of, you know, understanding of what goes into clinical trials, and when it comes to this type of clinical trial, number one, you have tons of people to recruit, who volunteer for it, who are more than willing to put themselves out there to receive this vaccine. Number two, when you have a disease that is spreading though the community like wildfire, it is not hard to meet your primary endpoints.You know, when you have a rare disease, for example, that you do a clinical trial on it may take you years to recruit enough people to to achieve your end point. So that’s the other thing. So those are the two sort of major things, in my opinion. And also, you know, when people say it was rushed but they don’t realize is that really what was rushed was the bureaucracy, the red tape, and that’s all that was rushed. When it comes to how these clinical trials were run, they were done by the books. They were designed perfectly beautifully. Everything was followed to a T. There was tons of oversight. So really, there was, in my opinion, nothing that was rushed about this at all.
Savannah:
I agree.
Tyler:
I think Christina said it perfectly. We’ve all said this, that I think that the biggest thing that hits home is what is going on in the world right now. We’re in a pandemic that literally every country is affected by. This is like a vaccine trial playground. Right? Like this is perfect circumstances to run something like this and I think that the problem is, that there are so many things that get put out to people that, “oh, my God, it’s only a year and these vaccines took five years.” And when you look into why those vaccines did take that long. I mean, we’re in 2021 too, right? I mean, we’re not doing things the same as we were 50, 60, 70 years ago. When you have a technology that’s been worked on for decades and you have this lovely pandemic to work with, it’s just like a recipe for almost perfection, really, to establish and make a vaccine.
Savannah:
Yeah, and you also have a lot of international involvement and coordination between the countries. We’ve got a shared interest among countries that we just want to get the funding. We want to have the infrastructure ready to go. A lot of things were approved on the condition that they would have assumed that the vaccine was going to pan out. So they went ahead and approved infrastructure in funding to funnel towards this, to have staffing and training and all that. So that is what the others have said, is the bulk of what takes so long to get clinical trials going and to study it and to get that data.
Tyler:
It’s almost like what we should be asking is why the heck has it been taking so long beforehand? Because of all the bureaucracy? I mean, I barely understood the bureaucracy until really, you know, we started looking into this in the last year as to what went into this. So instead of saying, “oh, my God, why is it rushed?” It’s like, “oh, my God, why have we never put this much energy and time into making vaccines?” Because diseases don’t always affect, you know, the United States. So why would they care about other countries? I mean, we should, but really, it comes down to economics and stuff like that. Why did it take something like this to make the process so much smoother? That is the question that we should all be asking.
Christina:
Yeah. And I think to add on to that, you know the old saying “necessity is the mother of invention”. With the urgency of this pandemic I think that obviously pushed these companies to really, really think very, very quickly and critically about how to create a vaccine against this. And also, Savannah mentioned funding. I mean, that was a big thing, right? Money was poured into this and that also helps quite a bit. And then the other piece, when you think about the technology, the MRNA technology in particular for the Pfizer, the Moderna vaccines, you know, these are brand new technologies in the sense that they’re not traditional vaccine technologies and traditional vaccines often require a dependance on cell culture and they depend on sort of this technology that really is always out of your control. You know, are your cells going to get contaminated or is the energy going to grow appropriately?
There’s a lot of extra steps, but honestly, making MRNA is fairly easy. It’s literally just nucleic acids that are synthesized in a lab. So you skip this whole sort of step of the process that usually is time consuming and resource heavy. So that’s another piece about this new technology. It’s really promising for the future as well for MRNA technology, how it’s going to be applied to future vaccines and how quickly we’re going to be able to get vaccines when the next pandemic hits us.
Tyler:
Plug and play technology right? That’s what they’re calling it. We just swap out. It is really cool. I mean, when you look into this and you spend the time to really inform yourself with it, I was like so excited to get the vaccine. I just think this is just so fascinating that we as humans have developed this and made it work and we have good data. I just think it is exciting.
Savannah:
That’s probably the the difference between somebody who is educated on this topic and who is not. When you’re educated, you get excited because I mean, this is the most fascinating thing to watch! The smartest people come together and come up with this brand new thing. But then you’ve got the people who aren’t educated and their response is to be scared because they don’t understand it. So I think our job is to bridge our excitement with these people who are scared so that everybody can have a shared love of science, because that is honestly, I know I speak for my two friends, that that’s honestly my favorite thing is, is science. I love science.
Christina:
As nerdy as that is, I totally with you. I think the other thing that comes to mind is that, you know, this whole pandemic, every step in this entire pandemic, whether it was from, testing or vaccine development or anything, this has all been on public display in a way that no other process ever is scientifically right? Most of the time, all these things happen in the background and behind the scenes, and the public has no clue about all these vaccines that are in development. And in fact, they don’t care, but now the public is invested in a way that they usually aren’t. And as such, they feel they have an opinion that they need to express because they’re being privy to this process that the public normally is not. So I think that’s another unique thing about this vaccine and this whole pandemic.
Tyler:
To add to that, because that’s that’s like actually a huge part of the problem. It’s also the people that are communicating these things, the media… they’re not angels. You have someone that’s not a science communicator, for example, they are, you know, a reporter, whatever, nd it’s the way they write the headline and the way they they take things out of context or they leave pertinent details out or people don’t read beyond the headline. So you’ve got all these new developments and you’ve got social media just pumping it out to people. It’s like they’re inundated with all these headlines and news articles that really lack a lot of substance. Then they hear what they want to hear or read what they want to read from that to come to their conclusions. And that’s also been a huge part of the problem.
Christina:
Yeah, I would say lack substance, but also lacking context, you know, and I think so much of what’s presented lacks that either scientific context or clinical context that is so important to understand. You know, and one thing that comes up, which is something that all three of us have combated quite a bit, is, you know, covid deaths. You know, how do you understand, Did people die from covid or with covid? And that is one of those things that really does require a clinical sort of context to put it into understand those nuances and that’s sort of a prime example, I think, of where we’ve seen that go wrong.
Tyler:
Big time.
Michelle:
Yeah, I just got in a Facebook argument about that yesterday. I don’t ever know why I’m still talking about covid like, obviously this is not a hoax!
So I would like to kind of pivot just slightly and talk about the comment that I hear often and that is “I’m not going to use anything and put anything in my body that’s not FDA approved”. And then I’m like, you’re taking supplements and look at your pop tarts, but OK.
Tyler:
That aren’t FDA approved your supplements.
Michelle:
Yeah, exactly. That’s why I’m like… they’re talking about how the immune system. So maybe Savannah will want to tackle that one, but that’s a very common thing that I keep hearing over and over again. I’m not going to do this because it’s not even FDA approved.
Savannah:
Well, they when they say that they don’t have any understanding of the approval process. It has been FDA approved, conditionally, under an emergency use authorization. When people say it hasn’t been approved, the picture that they’re trying to spin, is that the FDA didn’t approve it, so it’s being manufactured in some back alley and we’re just like giving it out like a drug. Like the FDA is very much involved with this process, and the only the difference between a conditional approval under an emergency use authorization and a full market approval is that there is an understanding and a very clear acceptance that if anything crops up between the time that it is conditionally approved to the conclusion of the trial, that they will pull it immediately.
I mean, this isn’t the first time that we’ve had an emergency use authorization. It’s just like Tyler said, it’s been so highly publicized that people freak out about things that they don’t understand.
Christina:
Yeah, and one example that comes to mind. I work in oncology. There was a cancer drug. I work in a very rare cancer called sarcomas. We rarely get new treatments because it’s such a rare cancer, but we did get an exciting new treatment a couple of years ago. Preliminary data was so encouraging that there was an EUA. We were giving it to everybody, and what happens about a year later? Because what happens with EUA is also studies are continuing, right, that studies don’t stop, data is continuing to be collected, and at some point down the road, the data came out that, in fact, it (the drug) didn’t improve survival as they thought it would. It didn’t cause bad outcomes, but it just didn’t improve survival as we hoped. So we had to stop giving it. It’s still being studied and it’s still being given in clinical trials. So that happens not just with vaccines, but with many different types of drugs when there is an urgency and when the data is promising EUAs can be issued, obviously, as Savannah said, with a lot of tcritical eyes on the data to make sure that they support the EUA. These committees don’t take this lightly at all.
Michelle:
Thank you for that. Perfectly put. That leads me into the question of because I’ve seen this just recently, which I feel like this is because there was some kind of news story out there. I don’t know where, but it was around that there’s no way for these the companies creating the vaccine to be held accountable if there are complications or side effects or any of those things. And Savannah I’ve already seen a TikTok from you about it so I am sure you are like, let me at it!
Savannah: This has been an anti-vaxxer talking point forever. It grinds my gears because that’s one of the first things they bring up. “Well, they can’t be held liable”. Well, first of all, they can. And I know you said that you’ve you’ve seen my TikTok on it, and I’ve made a couple of videos on this. Just because there is a process in place specifically for pursuing vaccine compensation because of a vaccine injury, that doesn’t mean that the manufacturers can’t be held liable.
There are several instances where they can still be held liable. But the only reason that this infrastructure is in place is so that you don’t bankrupt the manufacturers because everybody agrees and understands that vaccines save lives. If you bankrupt these vaccine manufacturers in a way that they can’t provide any more vaccine, you’re going to kill people. We’ve seen the behavior of these anti-vaxxers that get in this mob mentality. It could be very easy, if left unchecked, to really destroy companies just based on an evil agenda.
Tyler:
Savannah, just to echo that, I mean, Paul Offit wrote a really good book and he goes into like the history of the Anti-vax movement. And I actually, you know, I come from Canada where we don’t actually have a vaccine court like the U.S. does. And, you know, learning that there were pharmaceutical companies in the 80s that we’re going to be like, “we’re not going to make this anymore, we’re not going to make these vaccines”.
I mean, there’s a reason that these processes exist, because if we don’t have the companies making the vaccines, the vaccines aren’t made and we lose all the progress we’ve made to combat a lot of these infectious diseases. So I think that it’s one of these things where they take things out of context to try to scare people and make it seem like, you know, there’s this big evil plot to kill people with vaccines. And really it’s all comes down to like laws and there’s a whole history behind this whole topic.
Michelle:
The other follow up comment to that that I keep reading over and over again is more about the reactions to some of the ingredients. And if there’s, you know, reactions on all these other ones, then how can I know that I’m not going to have a reaction to this one? And I do understand some of that comes because there has been medical dishonesty and certain things, and especially for marginalized people through the years. So totally understand some of that, but also like how can I have that conversation with somebody to help them move past that fear.
Savannah:
To touch on the marginalized people, because I do a lot a lot of my outreach here in Mississippi where I currently live, is low income, underserved, historically left out populations of people, which in Mississippi it’s African-Americans. And there is a huge fear in the African-American community of feeling like they are going to be experimented on because historically speaking, they very much have been. I think in order to to address these populations of people is to not, not talk about it. I think talking about it and acknowledging it so that we can we can all move forward as a group, science minded.
I think that is a huge. A huge benefit in doing that. Also speaking on the marginalized people, there are a lot of people of color that are involved in this vaccine that just highlighting their accomplishments. I mean, Dr. Fauci congratulated. I don’t know if you’ll know her name. I can’t think of her name off the top of my head. But she was a really bright scientist that got congratulated personally by Dr. Fauci. So I think just on that topic of marginalized people, that I would suggest everybody educate themselves on the history of that and definitely acknowledge it.
Tyler:
I think we’re talking about Dr. Corbett.
Christina:
Yes, she’s a she’s a black female Ph.D. scientist at Moderna who was like the lead in developing this vaccine. I mean, it is amazing and so inspiring to witness that.
Yeah, I think it’s I totally agree with you Savannah. For me, whenever I think about kind of even in my job, in my setting, in my job every day, I always think when a patient presents with some sort of doubt or discomfort or worry about something, you know, I always have to think like, what is the cause of their distress or their worry and really try to get to the core and the crux of what it is that’s causing them to feel that way and try to address that.
Is it simply a lack of data and information? That’s easy, right, that you just give them the information. But for most of these folks, I think you have worries about the vaccine. It is not a matter of data and it’s not a matter of just spitting facts at them and they’ll feel better. It really is. I think, as you alluded to, Michelle, earlier, fear or somebody said this, it’s fear and worry of the unknown and uncertainty that drives a lot of these behaviors.
I think when people aren’t in the capacity to sort of recognize that it’s really fear driving this behavior, it’s very hard to sort of change that and it’s very hard to sort of change their perspective. So I think for those as you as you mentioned, Michelle, those that are worried about allergic reactions, I think the ingredient list is very clear for these two MRNA vaccines. In fact, the list is very short and it’s MRNA, lipids, salts and sugar buffering things basically to keep pH. And these are probably chemicals that are in most of the foods we eat and a lot of the things we consume anyway. You know, really the only contraindication that is stated by the CDC is if you have had a serious allergic reaction to any one of those ingredients in the past. And that is it. So I appreciate any hesitancy that people may have if they’ve had previous reactions to vaccines.
But I would encourage folks to not let that be a deterrent to get this potentially lifesaving vaccine in the midst of a pandemic.
Michelle:
Agreed.
What about if we have any young women on here that are interested in having kids or pregnant, breastfeeding, what is the advice for that population?
Savannah:
So, ACOG, the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology and the CDC both agree that as of right now, because of because the vaccine is under an emergency use authorization, no recommendation is going to be generalized to the whole population because the whole population isn’t getting the vaccine. So what’s the point of that? But as it stands now, the people that are prioritized to receive vaccine, which if you are pregnant or lactating or trying to conceive health care worker, the the guidance is that you should be allowed to receive the vaccine and be included in that shared clinical informed decision making.
The results from the DART trial, which is done in rats, showed no adverse outcomes in pregnant mice. And they’re still collecting data in this trial because women have inadvertently gotten pregnant in the trial process and there have been no adverse outcomes. And you also have to weigh that against the risk of getting covid and developing severe disease because pregnant women are at an increased risk for developing severe complications, including needing ventilation support. That’s even worse in obese individuals, African-Americans and people of color. So it’s always risk versus benefit in science and medicine.
So for pregnant individuals, after talking with your health care provider, I don’t know many health care providers that would say if you are a nurse or a pharmacist or a doctor in a health care setting, that you shouldn’t get the vaccine, especially if you’re at a high risk of exposure.
And then with breastfeeding, I think it’s a little bit more liberal in terms of 99.9% certain there’s not going to be any issue, but because that trial data has not come in yet, you can’t say, OK, it’s definitely 100 percent safe. But there are human milk studies. I am personally enrolled in one because I am still breastfeeding. If you understand the science of it and how lactation works, even if some component of the vaccine gets through the milk that the baby ingests, it’s going to be totally denatured, disintegrated in baby’s stomach acid. So, you know, the worst that’s going to happen is that baby is going to get antibodies from mom’s breast milk, which is another huge reason for lactating individuals to get vaccinated.
Christina:
Yeah, so I am also still nursing my younger son and I’m fully vaccinated. And, you know, it’s something I’m proud of. I’m proud that, you know, I may pass on some immunity to him. It’s really something I feel really good about. You know, I think the other thing to note is, you know, almost all clinical trials are going to have pregnancy as an exclusion criteria.
It’s something that’s in debate all the time that pregnant women should be included in some of these studies, obviously with informed consent. But, you know, they are often just automatically excluded. They do a pregnancy test before a study just to make sure you’re not pregnant. Right? So any data that’s going to come out is going to come out, like Savanah said, from incidental pregnancies that occur as people are on the study because nobody’s going to recruit pregnant women into a vaccine study.
But when you think about the biologic mechanism of these MRNA vaccines, there is no known or predictable biologic mechanism by which these could affect fertility, by which these could affect the health of a pregnancy or like Savannah said, have any negative effects on a breastfeeding child or baby. So I think that’s the other thing to think about is like really trusting the scientists who understand really the biologic mechanisms on a very detailed level and what other sort of consequences could occur in the human body as a result.
Michelle:
Beautifully said. Yes, thank you. So the other question I hear quite a lot or comment is like, why am I going to waste my time worrying about this vaccine if I still could infect others? Or why do I have to wear a mask after I am vaccinated?
Andrew:
I just saw a big blow on this on one of the dental forms, by the way. Two really strong personalities going at each other. It was just oh my gosh. Blew my brain.
Michelle:
And they are dentists no?
Andrew:
Yeah. They’re both dentists, of course.
Michelle:
I mean I’m just like, did you graduate with your degree. Just can I see it. Can I see your grades?
So I’m just curious, what, what are your thoughts on this?
Tyler:
I’ve been talking about this one so much lately. I think people need to understand that it’s a pandemic. It’s not a light switch. Right. Like we don’t just turn it off. This vaccine rollout is going to take who knows how long. It’s obviously been a bit of a mess. So it’s important that while we’re kind of mass vaccinating people, that we have to still remember that this is a pandemic and we still have to take precautions because not everybody’s vaccinated yet.
One country I’m particularly interested in following that I’ve been looking at is Israel, because they are doing a phenomenal job at vaccinating. And if you’re looking at some of the preliminary data coming out of that country, they’re already starting to see signs of decreased hospitalizations, for example, things like that. So I think as they vaccinate more people, they’re going to be very much of interest to watch in terms of how herd immunity and whatnot turns out for them.
And then in terms of people saying that, oh, I can still spread it to other people. The fact is we don’t actually know that. So we can’t say that it does or it doesn’t. We just don’t have the data yet. But again, some of the preliminary data coming out of Israel looking at serological studies of patients that were tested after their second dose, 6 to 20 times increase in antibodies like significantly higher than what’s seen in the natural infection, and what they’re thinking based on the high level of antibodies, is that they likely will not be a carrier. But we can’t say that for sure yet. We need to see how this pans out a little bit more. So far, the data that we’re seeing is promising. We have to keep an open mind. We’re in a pandemic. This is an unprecedented world issue. We’re trying to vaccinate as many people as we can and we just can’t, you know, immediate gratification. Right. Like, we just have to let that go for a little bit. We’ve been at this for a year. We can keep doing this with some hope at the end. A light at the end of the tunnel. That’s how I kind of look at it.
Christina:
To add on to that. So, you know, when it comes to these clinical trials, that they designed for the vaccines, you know, in the midst of this pandemic where so many people are dying in hospital systems, overwhelmed, they had to create primary endpoints that were going to be sort of the most urgent issue, which is can these vaccines reduce the risk of disease, severe disease, hospitalizations and deaths?
These are the most critical things. So those are the primary outcomes. Other outcomes are continuing to come out as more data is collected. And one of those outcomes will be transmission. So the thing that is important to remember is there’s a difference between disease and infection. Right. So far, the outcomes from the studies have looked at lowering the risk of disease. Infection is a different issue. Can it also reduce your risk of infection and thereby transmission of this virus?
So the thing is that pretty much every vaccine up until this point does reduce transmission or infection. So it is fully expected that these vaccines are going to as well. But like Tyler said, we are an evidence based community. We’re not just going to say something without data to back it up. And until we get that data, we can’t be for sure. The other thing, too, like Tyler said, is, this is not a light switch. I think a lot of people, like you said, really hope that it’s just you get the vaccine and life goes back to normal. But that is not the case. Nothing has changed for me in my life but how I manage things, if anything, I’ve been more paranoid and more cautious because of these new variants that are out there. So if anything, I’ve been more cautious, but we have to sort of realize that it’s not something that’s going to switch right away. And that’s why we do need to continue doing all the precautions that we’ve been doing until we get enough of the population vaccinated, such that community transmission starts to go down enough that we feel enough of the population has been adequately immunized.
Savannah:
And to add on that, Christina, what people need to also understand is that the faster we get everybody immunized, the less likely this virus can mutate and then escape the effectiveness of the vaccine. So when people are like, “I don’t understand, the vaccine doesn’t even work. We’ve got variants.” Im like because we don’t have everybody vaccinated! Like get it together!
Michelle:
So can we speak to the variants, like what is happening for us that don’t really understand that whole situation?
Christina:
All RNA viruses mutate and that’s a normal thing that happens because they’re replicating so frequently and so often that mutations are bound to happen. The question is, are any of these those mutations clinically significant? Most of them are not. Most of them don’t change anything in how the virus behaves, but some of those mutations do become significant. The thing about viruses, like with all sort of things is evolution takes hold. Right. The mutations that are going to sort of stick around are the ones that improve that virus’s survival.
So if it can basically find a mutation that allows it to become more infectious, more virulent, more easily binding to Ace 2 receptors on our cells, needing less viral particles to cause infection or disease, then that virus is going to choose that mutation as a favorable one and continue to sort of pass that on, so to speak. Like Savannah said, this happens because we are allowing this virus to propagate in the community. If the virus does not have the opportunity to find a host, then these mutations do not occur. We are letting this virus run rampant, masks are not being worn, and that is exactly what’s giving this virus a chance to continue to mutate and for us to continue to develop these more virulent strains.
Michelle:
So we’re all health care providers on this podcast right now and I’m curious what your thoughts are on making it mandatory as a health care provider to have the vaccine if you’re going to treat patients?
Christina:
Yes.
Savannah:
Yes.
Tyler:
I agree.
I just I don’t understand why this topic is so controversial, because I had to have vaccines to go to nursing school. I needed to have proof of vaccines to enter any hospital. I did a rotation in and I had to have vaccines for any employer I’ve ever had. I have to get a flu shot every year. I mean, and then and even despite that, if we want to get down to the whole all, you know, it’s like my choice.
You’re an evidence based medical professional. Our job is evidence based. It’s paramount to our field. So we should be embracing the evidence that’s paramount to our field. We should be practicing what we preach. If we cannot be supportive of the evidence that makes our field up, like what are we doing in this field? I think that that’s the point that I like to always drive home because we can go on so many side tangents about mandatory this and mandatory that it’s it comes down to science, and do you support your field that is built on science?
Savannah:
Yeah. If you support your field that is based on science, it should not matter if it’s mandatory or not. So why does it matter.
Christina:
I completely agree with that and I think that, this also brings up another point, which is, I think a lot of people view this vaccine on a very individual level, like, is it going to help ME? And that’s all I care about. Is it going to help me be able to not wear a mask when I go to the store anymore? I think for for me and for maybe other health care professionals, it’s also about protecting our patients. It’s about protecting our community. I think it’s about participating in public health on the whole. For us to recognize that this small part that I play in getting my vaccine helps the pandemic get under control in general. Right. So I just wish that people, health care providers and health care professionals and otherwise would recognize that these small gestures of getting a mask, maybe a not so small gesture, getting vaccine, because a lot of people feel that’s a heavy decision, but getting the vaccine, I think these are all things that we can individually do that help us individually but do help the situation. On the whole, we need to get past this frickin pandemic.
Tyler:
Just to echo that, I think the other thing is, is we’re health care professionals. We have an influence on people and I think that just speaking from coming from the nursing profession, you know, nurses have consistently been the most trusted profession when we talk about health care. I I take a lot of pride in that because this past year I’ve questioned how many people I can even trust in my own field because of some of the misinformation I’ve seen. I think that we don’t realize just how much of an influence people have. I mean, I have patients that call me for their opinion on almost anything, because they want to know what I think and, you know, sometimes you might you know, I might laugh about that and I think, like, that’s how powerful we are as health care professionals. So we really need to set an example to the public. And when we have health care professionals arguing about, you know, about science, for example, and you’re a member of the public and you’re like, well, what the heck do I believe? It becomes very concerning and I think that we’ve seen a lot of that over the last year and that’s why I think kind of always circling this around to evidence in science and not so much maybe your emotions and your feelings about that, but the actual points that we want to drive home, because that’s the influence that we have on people and we need to practice what we preach so that people see that.
Michelle:
Yeah, I mean, I’m actually having so many feelings around this because I do believe in bodily autonomy, but I also teach infection control. I have an infection control company and I’m like breaking the chain of infection. Vaccines play a huge part of that. In dentistry, I mean, we’re just aerosolizing potentially infectious body fluids on the reg, like just splashing up into our face on every patient on the hour. Right. And so I’m just like I’m so torn with my profession because it’s people that I thought were very into science and very into understanding the scientific method and how all this was going to work, are like, “no, and I shouldn’t have to. I shouldn’t be made to”. We’re seeing this battle between employers mandating it and then everybody losing their shit over that whole idea and now we’re also seeing there’s a whole other level or layer is that we’re seeing patients come in to see us and asking their provider if they’ve gotten the vaccine and we’re seeing people pissed off about that. Like, this is none of your business and I’m like, what the hell are we even doing? Like, this makes no sense to me. So I’m really happy to hear that. I mean, it’s kind of a little confirmation bias for me, but I don’t know. I feel very good about it.
Tyler:
No you bring up a good point, I think, because it’s a tough topic, like everyone’s going to have their opinions on it but I think at the end of the day, it’s like, why do we even have to have this discussion? It’s like we know that washing our hands is a good thing. So no one’s going to argue that. When we start applying our feelings and, you know, maybe misinformation that we read about the vaccine, then we start to open the door to, “oh, well, maybe I don’t need to get it” when the fact is that we need to be driving home the facts about the vaccine.
Just because we don’t know some things about it doesn’t mean that that’s bad. Like we’ve already talked about, you know, possibly that carriers/spread thing, but I think that we just need to be very consistent in our messaging and evidence and science and so forth.
Michelle:
So I I hear a lot of people also being curious, not so much questioning this, but just really curious. Like if they’ve had covid, do they need to get the vaccine?
Christina:
Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. Like Tyler alluded to about the data coming out of Israel. Right. You know, what we understand from natural infection is that there is a wide range of immune responses that can happen and that could be due to a number of factors, one of which could be how much inoculum are you receiving? How much viral load are you receiving when you actually get infected with covid? That could determine the robustness of your own immune response. And then there’s duration of response, too, which is also quite variable. And studies have shown a wide range of duration of response from natural infection, whereas with a vaccine there is a set dose, so to speak, of inoculum that you’re receiving, quote unquote and it can produce a little bit more of a predictable response. And like Tyler said, the studies are showing that the response that folks are getting from the immunization is much more robust than what most people would get from a natural infection. So even though somebody has had a prior infection and absolutely does not guarantee that they can’t get infected again, whether from the same virus or from a variant of that virus, and that those folks are not in any way safe and they, too, need to get vaccinated absolutely.
Michelle:
I’m sure you guys hear this a lot, too. But I have a healthy immune system. I’m just going to let it work. I feel like covid is the new chicken pox thing where like everybody was like having these chicken pox parties and now they’re having covered parties.
Tyler:
Come and work in the ICU is what I say to people like that because I will tell you, as someone that does spend and has spent most of their career in the ICU, I mean, and I even think with flu, I mean, yes, we know that elderly people are going to be disproportionately affected by this. That that just makes sense. Right. But when you’re intubating a 28 year old or when you’re intubating a 33 year old and these are otherwise fairly healthy people, it hits home when you’re in your 30s and you see that. I think that this whole I have a healthy immune system thing, it just it just shows that you don’t really understand your immune system, because this virus, the way that it affects people, is very variable, and I’ll tell you, as someone that’s been working on the front lines with the virus, it’s not a gamble that I’m willing to take. So as someone that sees it almost every day, I’m telling you, I would not want to gamble with trying to get covid.
So if people that are working with it every day say that, it has to tell you something, it’s not something that you should think about gambling, about. Just my opinion.
Savannah:
Even if you have a healthy immune system, how selfish is that to put other people at risk just because you will probably be fine. The reality is the vast majority of Americans have at least one preexisting condition that would put them at risk for severe covid illness. So what are you even really talking about? 60 plus percent of Americans, they don’t matter if they die because well you shouldn’t have been fat or you shouldn’t have had COPD, like what? That doesn’t make any sense.
Christina:
And we hear so much of that. It is just it’s shameful when people say things like that. I think to add on to this, you know, this is a novel virus, right? This is a novel coronavirus. Coronavirus is a large family of viruses, most of which affect animals. But there are, I think, seven now that affect humans. This is one of the new ones that our human species has not seen prior to this pandemic.
That means there is no immunity in our population globally to this particular novel coronavirus. That means it doesn’t matter how healthy the immune system you have is because nobody’s immune system has ever seen this before. It is something that is truly unprecedented since hundreds of years ago, maybe to this dramatic extent. Yes, we’ve had other novel viruses show up in other novel coronavirus show up in recent years, but nothing to this extent with regard to how sort of devastating it’s been to health systems and to populations.
So, again, that healthy immune system argument to me number 1) reflects a complete lack of understanding of what an immune system is and number 2) just neglects the fact that this is a novel virus that our population has never seen before.
Tyler:
And to add to that, because a lot of people’s argument is, well, it’s not going to kill me. I’ll get over this. What does that mean long term, because of all the patients, the long hauler patients that we’re seeing, I’m seeing a lot more of them now in outpatient because I do a mix of hospital and clinic. And the patients that I see outpatient have been anywhere from 25 to 65 and they have long hauler symptoms and we’re talking three to six months of fatigue and cough and shortness of breath. And I don’t I have nothing to offer these people because it’s just like Christine said, it’s a novel virus. We still don’t understand what this is affecting. I just saw an article recently about the changes in the cardiovascular system that they’re seeing now on on a very cellular level.
We don’t know the long term effects of this virus at all. We’re going to and we’re starting to learn more as time goes on. It’s concerning because when you hear someone, it’s like a false dichotomy you are either going to die or you’re going to be fine. And that’s just not the case we live on planet Earth where everything is gray, basically gray areas to everything. It’s dismissive. People don’t want to come to terms with these uncomfortable truths. As someone that’s been forced into that for the past year, I think that more people need to understand that there’s a big, uncomfortable truth about this virus. It’s not just about dying. And even if you survived, you want to be in the hospital for a month? That’s expensive. It’s burdensome, you know, recover from an ICU visit… I mean, even before covid, I mean, people can be in rehab for weeks to months after ICU stays. It really depends on how bad, how sick you were. I think there’s just so much uncertainty but there is still some certainty as to what we’re seeing right now with patients and it’s concerning, and it’s concerning enough that I wanted to get that vaccine as soon as it came out.
Michelle:
I think people think that it’s just “I’m not going to be so sick like so I’m not going to be terrible. Like, I’ll be fine. I’ll stay at home.” But it’s like when you do, like the financial burden of your medical care and if you have insurance and I’ll tell you right now, most of dentistry, we do not have good insurance. Like we are small businesses, we have individual dentist owners, and we might have less than five employees and I have not ever had health insurance as a dental hygienist, In 20 years.
Andrew:
It’s very rare in private practice. In corporation they have it, but in private practice, it’s almost none.
Michelle:
So it’s just amazing to me that people are just flippant about that. I’m like, y’all enjoy that medical bill.
Savannah:
Well, and usually when you have the people with this attitude that say, “I’ll get it and I’ll be fine”, they’re not not the ones taking precautions. You know, good and damn well they’re going to the grocery store, and the day you show symptoms isn’t the day that you are infectious. So what have you been doing in the days prior to that, because my rights I’m going to go to go get a hamburger and blah blah it’s like, come on, like you are the same people that are contributing to these covid numbers, so it’s not just like I’ll get it and I’ll be fine, it’s what else are you doing?
Christina:
Right. I think to add on to what Tyler was talking about also with the long hauler syndrome or post-covid syndrome. The thing is, again, novel virus, you know, we’re just learning about this, every day, learning something new. I am sure that as time goes on, this sort of post covid syndrome will be characterized much more specifically and categorized into like pulmonary complications, vascular, renal, all these other specific organ specific complications. I’m sure each specialty is going to develop their own subspecialty of like covid related renal issues or whatever. I think one thing I did post about this a while back. One thing that kind of reflects how serious this is, is that Spaulding Rehab, which is a huge rehab hospital in the Boston area, they developed an entire rehab program to covid recovery, which, you know, for those that say it’s just the flu, you never see a dedicated flu recovery program.Right? I mean, this is so unique because the other thing is and Tyler correct me if I’m wrong, but a lot of patients who require ICU level stay with covid complications. They are there for a prolonged period of time. They are often intubated and sedated for weeks and weeks and weeks without knowing are they going to get better or get worse? If you’re in the ICU, intubated, sedated for weeks, believe me, you are going to have muscle wasting. You’re going to have to relearn how to walk, eat, swallow, do everything and that is not an easy feat for even the healthiest person that walked into that situation.
Tyler:
And that’s actually a huge part of the problem is that these patients are not coming to the unit for a day or two, they’re there for a long time. I mean, I even have had patients that were not intubated that were on high flow for several weeks and they had, you know, lung fibrosis on their CT scans like a month later. And they were in the hospital for weeks, and that’s the issue is that people don’t understand. It’s like, yeah, we we have hospitals to take care of sick people, but I mean, there’s not just covid that people are in the hospital with and most of hospitals are busy without a pandemic, and so you start adding a bunch of covid patients into the mix and they’re there for a long time.
We have staffing issues. We have bed issues. These people don’t get better overnight, and that’s the very concerning part about the disease. That’s another reason why the vaccine is so important to prevent it, but also therapeutics to treat it, too, because, I mean, it’s just a very long, drawn out illness.
We’ve seen sick flu patients that, you know, but nothing like this. I’ve worked bad flu seasons. I’ve just never seen ICUs two thirds full of flu patients that are there for a month. Like, it just doesn’t happen. We just don’t see that. I think that the boots on the ground, people that are in the thick of the harder areas and, I’m in an area where it was kind of hard hit at the beginning, but not nearly as bad as some other places that my colleagues have been at and I think that, like those people, like just talk to them, just talk to them about a day in their life and they will tell you the truth and their realities. It’s burning out and it’s exhausting.
Michelle:
What are your thoughts on vitamin D? So vitamin D in dentistry is kind of very popular right now. We see that many people are deficient, myself was included for a really long time and we’re seeing how it affects bone healing after extractions and dental implants placed, how it kind of contributes to some parasomnias and clenching and grinding being one of them, which is definitely in our wheelhouse. And so we have taken like, well, if everybody is following the science, they’re really looking hard at vitamin D, and I have been postulating that is should be labeled almost like a comorbidity in the amount of people that are deficient in vitamin D. Do you all have any thoughts on that?
Christina:
I think this is falls in the category of there have been observational sort of studies. There’s been correlations made between vitamin D deficiency and maybe more severe disease, as there have been other correlations, you know, higher mumps titers is correlated with less. So there’s observations. And the thing about these observations is that it’s exciting, but it doesn’t mean anything until more studies are done to actually demonstrate correlation or causation, rather and most people, like you said, are probably Vitamin D deficient.
I live in New England. Everybody here is pale as a ghost, and we are all Vitamin D deficient. So is it going to hurt, you know, to take a vitamin D supplement?Obviously talk to your own providers, but probably not going to hurt. Is it really going to help in any meaningful way? I don’t think we can say anything like that for sure.
Michelle:
Andrew, do you have any last comments? This is what happens when a super sciencey thing comes on I nerd out for an hour and Andrew just sits and takes it all in.
Andrew:
I was just thinking, man, like, these are TikTok-ers like, what did you find these people? These are amazing, amazing people.
I’ve loved all of this. The thing that I wish our audience could see, though, too, is Christina’s specifically if Tyler’s making a good point, Savannah’s making good points shes like, yes, that’s it! Pointing and getting all excited like fake clapping. I wish everyone could see that. There’s so much excitement about the science, and I think that that is something in a lot of our episodes that people can really relate to. And I don’t really have any questions necessarily for you, for you all.
This has been awesome. I just I’m really excited for our audience that you guys are able to share with them. It’s been awesome. Thank you.
Michelle:
Yeah, truly.
Savannah:
I know I speak for the group that we are very thankful that you invited us on. It’s a good opportunity for us because we have become very close. We’re not just like colleagues and we don’t just share information. We talk every day, all day long, like me and Tyler. We’ve got this weird connection that we’ve had since the day that we met, so to speak, on TikTok. And so I just I love these people, I look up to them. I admire them and I am so thankful that at least in this pandemic, because I think for all of us, the pandemic is what kind of brought us to Tik Tok out of boredom or just curiosity or whatever that in that with something beautiful has come out of this. And that’s a lifelong friendship. So for that, I’m thankful.
Christina:
Yeah, I totally agree with that. I think, you know, I think all of us get our share of trolls and really nasty, really, really nasty comments and people. And there have been many times where I was like “I am deleting this app. I can’t handle this like mental health can’t handle this” these people here have literally kept me alive and kept me going on this app to further our mission of spreading science and data and evidence. And I feel so motivated by these guys. I love them to pieces me and Savannah, our kids are a week apart in age from each other, born just a week apart. They both just turned two like there’s just… I love these guys. I just love them.
Tyler:
I will echo my love for everybody as well. But you’re right, Christina, because I think that’s, you know, and even going back to Michelle at the beginning, OK, how much time do we spend doing this like it is mentally draining because, I mean, this is real life. I mean, it’s social media. You know, at the beginning I thought, you know, this is Tik Tok, whatever. I mean, it’s pretty serious. And I think that, you know, I kind of like debated that, too, like, “oh, like, what am I doing here? Is this worth it?” And then I just think about the pros and cons of social media. And there are many pros and there are many cons and there is a coordinated effort against this vaccine by many people in the Anti-vax community and I will not give up that fight. I don’t like that it has to be a fight, but I think that you have to have a strong voice and you’ve got to keep speaking. And if you’ve got to take a little bit of time, it is what it is. We all rely on each other for moral support. We all communicate with each other about what the new misinformation on the block is, so to speak, for the week and I think that that’s what keeps us going, you know, and we have to kind of balance the pros and the cons. We know that there are a lot of each and we choose the pro side and we want to be the voice that people need to hear and to be there to answer questions and to, you know, spread the good word.
Michelle:
Y’all do a fantastic job. I feel so honored to have you guys on. I do appreciate all of your content. You put it in a way that makes complete sense to even the person that doesn’t have a science background. I love your sassiness that comes along with it. The sarcasm actually is just like the cherry on top of the content for me. So thank you for that.
Andrew:
That’s your love language, though, Michelle.
Tyler:
You’ve got to keep people listening. We want to connect with people and I think I speak for Sav and Christina like and being in nursing, Christina, you’ll agree with me on this, is you know, historically physicians is like this whole hierarchy thing. They come, in with their tie on, and it;s like “oh, there’s the doctor”. I want to connect with people. I’m real. I want people to know that health care professionals are real people. We have real feelings and real opinions and lives. I think people connect with you better when you speak to them that way or when you speak like an actual human. I’m not a robot. I want to be monotone. I’m me, and you know, if my content’s for you, it’s for you. If it’s not, it’s not, that’s fine, but the fact is, you know, it’s about the message and connecting with people, and I’ve been able to do that and if I can continue doing that, then I’ve done my job.
Christina:
Totally.
Savannah:
Here. Here.
Michelle:
well, thank you guys so much. Do you want to give your Tik Tok Handles?
Tyler:
@thatsassynp
Savannah:
@rx0rcist
Christina:
@christinaaaaaaanp
Michelle:
Thank you again so much. Thank you for all you’re doing to contribute to science and for coming on the podcast informing our audience.
Christina:
Thank you.
Savannah:
Thank you.
Tyler:
Thank you all so much.
