Since the arrival of the COVID-19 disease, we are not only surviving a pandemic but are also fighting an ‘infodemic’, to be precise ‘misinfodemic’. Spreading misinformation about a particular thing is not a modern phenomenon, but as we grow more and more with time, the modern improvisations in the misinformation forwarded make them look more real. Recently, as the Government of India is scaling up its vaccination drive by allowing all adults above the age of 18 years to get vaccinated, a massively viral message on social media is alerting women above 18 to not take the COVID-19 vaccine five days before and after their menstrual cycle claiming that doing so can affect their immunity.
While such information is making rounds on the internet, in reality, there is no such data that can link the vaccines to changes in the menstruation cycles of women. However, when this fake news was spreading like a wildfire on social media, many doctors and medical practitioners started to debunk the misinformation and stated the fact that vaccinations are not going to affect women’s menstruation. It was also claimed that fearing such misinformation, females above 18 should not delay or withhold their vaccination. She can take the jab after, before, or even during her periods unless she is planning for a baby.
Fake claims that are being made:
#Myth No. 1: Don’t take the vaccine before and after 5 days of your periods because immunity will be very less during periods.
Various sources reveal that periods have no effect on the immunity levels of a woman and therefore, there’s no problem if a woman gets vaccinated even during her periods. The vaccine in no way is going to affect a women’s period and similarly, periods have no effect on the vaccine. Therefore, no delay should be made in taking a vaccine just because of periods.
#Myth No. 2: Dosage of vaccination first decreases our immunity and later it builds immunity, so there is a high risk of attack for one who gets vaccinated during periods.
Firstly, not even a single report suggests that a person’s immunity is decreased after getting the vaccine and then later after some time the immunity increases. The above claim makes no sense and therefore no such claims should be believed until and unless backed by solid evidence and proof.