Tag: RNA

The Cow-Pock

The return of the revenge of “COVID-19 mRNA vaccines permanently alter your DNA” and “lab leak”

Claims that COVID-19 vaccines "permanently alter your DNA" or that SARS-CoV-2 was engineered in a lab were resurrected last week based on two dubious studies. No matter how many times you think these myths have been debunked, they always come back for another installment of the same misinformation franchise.

/ February 28, 2022
Dr. Gorski gets the COVID-19 vaccine

Syncope and Bell’s palsy: Distinguishing correlation from causation for adverse events observed after COVID-19 vaccination

The FDA has approved emergency use authorizations (EUAs) for two COVID-19 vaccines, and the largest mass vaccination program in history has begun. Look for antivaxxers to attribute reactions to the vaccine that the vaccine very likely didn't cause. We'll examine the example stories of vasovagal syncope and Bell's palsy that were reported by the press last week.

/ December 21, 2020
Central Dogma of Molecular Biology

No, the Moderna and Pfizer RNA vaccines for COVID-19 will not “permanently alter your DNA”

With the new mRNA vaccines developed by Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna likely to be available soon, antivaxxers have been ramping up the fear mongering. Their latest claim is that mRNA vaccines will "permanently alter your DNA" or even "make you transhuman." Such claims rest on an utter ignorance of the totality of what we know about the biology of DNA, RNA, and how...

/ November 30, 2020

One reason mouse studies often don’t translate to humans very well

Mouse models are often used as preclinical models of human disease, but the number of drugs that succeed in mice but go on to be approved as a drug for humans is only about one in ten. A new study comparing gene expression in the cells of human brains with those of mouse brains provides new insight into why.

/ August 26, 2019