Vaccine Ingredient Misconceptions, Debunked

- Can we talk about ingredients?

'Cause people say there's all these crazy things in vaccines, like aluminum, formaldehyde, mercury, not Freddie.

(rock guitar music) - There's no Freddie Mercury in the vaccine.

- Well, that's too bad.

(playful music) - Here's the thing.

Vaccines are made up of a lot of stuff and it's all to make them not only sterile and safe, but also effective.

- Like why formaldehyde in a shot, not a big deal.

When I've seen a sheep's brain (sheep bleating) sitting in a jar of formaldehyde.

Why is that not a big deal?

- That's not-- - But feels like a big deal.

- Obviously, formaldehyde sheep's brain is not a good association, right?

But check this out.

A very small amount or formaldehyde is used to keep vaccines sterile.

Formaldehyde is a chemical that is a by-product of DNA metabolism.

So, that happens in our cells every day, all the time.

- Oh!

- And babies.

- It's already in our bodies.

- It's already in our bodies.

- Okay.

- Babies will have 50 to 70 times the amount of formaldehyde than a vaccine circling through their blood all the time.

Demystified.

- See?

- I didn't know that.

- No big deal.

- I didn't know that.

But if I was just searching on the internet, and I saw formaldehyde, I would freak out, just like I'm freaking out now.

- Just get beyond the name and you just get to the root of it.

- And ask.

- Like aluminum.

Aluminum.

Aluminum toxicity.

You will see that pasted on so many articles like aluminum toxicity.

And I'm like, yes, aluminum has been used in vaccines for over 50 years to help them be more effective and too much aluminum is toxic.

Too much salt is toxic, too much kombucha can also be bad for you.

- Is it really bad?

- Yeah.

Kombucha.

- [Alok Voiceover] But I should stress, aluminum toxicity is really only found in people who wind up with a high level of aluminum in their body and can't properly get rid of it.

And certain people are at a higher risk of aluminum toxicity, such as those who are on dialysis, get IV nutrition or who are constantly exposed to aluminum in their environments.

- But here's the thing, vaccines contain a really, really, really small amount of aluminum.

Our kidneys can handle it and throw it out there.

And kids actually take in way more aluminum from breast milk, food, living on planet earth where the crust of our planet has a lot of aluminum.

- Oh, really?

- (laughs) A lot of that gets into our bloodstream anyway and our kidneys get rid of it.

It's not a big deal.

Mercury also causes toxicity and people will say-- - Mercury retrograde, so toxic.

- Different mer...

Different.

I like where your head's at.

- Thank you.

- I feel like every day is mercury retrograde on the internet.

- It's mercury retrograde now whenever you're watching.

(soft music) - But now mercury as it applies to vaccines, you will hear people talk about thimerosol, which is a vaccine preservative.

- I talk about that a lot.

I have a group.

We get together, we drink chardonnay, we talk about thimerosol.

- But two things about thimerosol, aside from what you talk about in your group.

- Yep.

- We don't use it in the majority of vaccines nowaday and also thimerosol was made from ethyl mercury.

Stay with me.

- I love that name, it's so old school.

- Ethyl mercury, is super old school.

- Ethyl, ethyl.

Hazel mercury.

- Methyl mercury, is the type of mercury you think about when you think of seafood toxicity.

[Alok voiceover] It's formed when bacteria react with naturally occurring mercury found in water, soil, and plants.

It enters the food chain through fish and animals, and at high levels, it can be toxic to people.

- So, it is not the same chemical that people say like oh my God, mercury toxicity from seafood.

How can you put that in vaccines?

And I'm like, not the same type of mercury.

- [Alok Voiceover] The mercury found in thimerosol is ethyl mercury and our bodies process it differently from methyl mercury.

Ethyl mercury lasts less than a week in the body, which makes exposure in the blood fairly brief.

On top of that, ethyl mercury is actively secreted by the gut, meaning it leaves the body in our poop.

So it doesn't build up or cause any problems.

- And like I said, we don't use thimerosol and the vast majority of vaccines.

- Okay.

- So, the mercury toxicity thing is basically gone.

And aluminum formaldehyde, not scary either.

- Dashed.

- [Alok] It is possible for people to develop a severe allergic reaction to a vaccine, but it's extremely rare.

It's about 1.4 in every million doses for most vaccines.

What about egg allergies?

Some vaccines contain proteins from chicken eggs.

If your child has a mild to moderate egg allergy, there's nothing to worry about with the vaccines.

Even if your child has a severe egg allergy, it's still safe to get any vaccine with egg protein as long as it's done under medical supervision.

More common side effects include pain, redness and swelling at the injection site.

But these symptoms are typically mild and they resolve within one to three days.

Throughout history, there have been some moments where vaccine safety had to be addressed.

An infamous example, known as the Cutter incident, took place in 1955.

There were cases of polio, linked to contaminated vaccine doses from one specific laboratory.

In another instance, during the '50s and early '60s, up to 30% of polio vaccines were contaminated with a simian or a monkey virus.

In this case, there's not much evidence that simian virus did any harm, but public concern over cases like these led the US government to increase oversight, monitoring and regulation of vaccines.

The result, the United States currently has the safest vaccine supply in its history.

- Are you gonna talk about formaldehyde at the next chardonnay meetup?

- No, I feel like I should start a separate one.

Because there's like a lot of layers to that.

You know, I saw a starfish in formaldehyde, like in biology class, all the things we dissected were in formaldehyde.

So, I think we're gonna have to support each other.

Really try to work through our feelings about formaldehyde.

- Formaldehyde has feelings too.

- Does it?

Well.

(soft music)