‘Whatever vaccine you can get, take it’

Omar E. Zapata | THE RIDER

On Feb. 27, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued an emergency use authorization for the J&J/Janssen vaccine, also known as the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, for the prevention of COVID-19.

Dr. Scott Spear, medical director for Student & Employee Health and an associate professor of pediatrics, told The Rider the main differences between the Johnson & Johnson vaccine and other vaccines are the efficacy rate, the single dose instead of two and how it does not have to be kept refrigerated as cold. 

Spear said two-dose vaccines, such as the Pfizer and Moderna, both use messenger RNA so the body can create an immune response. 

“So, the mRNA, it has a carrier that gets into the cells and then the messenger RNA produces … proteins,” he said.  “It assembles the proteins that the body needs to [identify] to make antibodies to be protected [against COVID-19].” 

Instead of using mRNA, the Johnson & Johnson vaccine uses a viral vector, Spear said. 

“It uses adenovirus, which is a common virus,” he said. “The virus is not infective, but it has the ability to, again, put these proteins into the cells that, then, the cells can produce enough of the antigen that the immune system needs to see. … But what the vaccines do is cause the body to produce antibodies that help protect the person against the live virus, because it goes and fights the part of the virus that attaches to our cells.” 

The Johnson & Johnson vaccine is about 85% effective in preventing severe to critical COVID-19 occurring at least 28 days after vaccination, according to the FDA. 

Spear said the Johnson & Johnson vaccine is not quite as effective as the two-dose mRNA vaccine, but it is still effective as it prevents death and is close to what the mRNA vaccines do for preventing severe COVID-19 disease.

The side effects from the Johnson & Johnson vaccine are similar to the other vaccines, he said. It may cause headaches, fatigue, muscle aches, nausea, fever, pain and redness or swelling around the area of injection. 

“Interestingly, the side effects are more common in younger people than in older adults,” Spear said. 

Most of the side effects occur within one or two days following vaccination and are mild to moderate in severity, according to the FDA. 

Spear said there are advantages with the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, such as it being a single dose and how it does not have to be kept in a freezer. 

“It’s probably going to be a good [vaccine] to give out to places, like pharmacies, so then they don’t have to then track somebody getting a second dose,” he said. “They don’t have to worry about, you know, how to maintain the vaccine. It’s going to improve the ability to get it out to a larger number of folks than the Pfizer, which definitely is challenging, because you’ve got to have a super cold freezer.” 

Spear said it will be easier to get the vaccine to people in a lot of different settings and situations. 

“We spend a lot of time with the other two vaccines, [with] setting up the second dose,” he said.  “You don’t have to do that with the Johnson & Johnson … and the easier handling of it is a big advantage.” 

Spear said he thinks the Johnson & Johnson vaccine can be in more places that are more convenient to people, like pharmacies, grocery stores and at more convenient times as well. 

“It increases the chance of finding a place that fits your schedule to receive it,” he said. “The more types we have, the more places that can give them, the more effective it’s going to be at stopping this pandemic. So, it’s another weapon we have, and it’s good to have this, and it’s also very safe and highly effective.” 

Lindanna Saldaña, a mass communication junior, told The Rider she has yet to receive any vaccine but has  been wanting to for herself and her family. 

Asked if she would get the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, she replied “I don’t know, since it’s new. I don’t know how it is or how it has affected people.” 

Saldaña said she worries about the vaccine because it has a lower efficacy rate and it is fairly new, so she does not know the full side effects.  

“I don’t know if I would try it first,” she said. “I would like to see the feedback on it because I know my mom, she has her illnesses, and my brother has Down syndrome. I don’t want anything to happen to them.” 

Saldaña said if the vaccine is safe after a couple of months and is the only one available to her, she would probably get it. 

Similarly, Kassandra Lin Elizondo, an exercise science senior, said she is skeptical of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. 

Elizondo said she is fully vaccinated with the Pfizer vaccine that she received from UT Health RGV. 

“It was recently just approved,” she said. “So, I feel like we haven’t had enough time to see if it really causes effects to the, like, general public, as opposed to, like, Pfizer and Moderna,” she said. “We’ve had a little bit more time with those vaccines to see how people react with them.” 

Spear does not recommend waiting to get the Pfizer and Moderna vaccine as the main thing for people to do is to get vaccines as soon as possible to prevent infection of COVID-19 and preventing variants. He said variants that are more infectious are not being created by themselves in the air but when someone is infected. 

“Get what you can get and the sooner the better,” Spear said. “Don’t wait because if you’re waiting, then you’re increasing the risk of getting infected and developing and getting infected with one of these variants.” 

He said the Johnson & Johnson vaccine has many advantages to it but for people to get whichever vaccine is available to them. 

“How we end the pandemic is getting more people vaccinated … and then that will allow us to eventually go back to our more normal lives,” Spear said. “We’ll probably still be wearing masks for some period of time, but I think it’ll allow us to do, you know, a lot of the things that we have not been able to do for the last year.”