People across the country are reporting a new side effect of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine, calling it the “Modern Arm”.
What is happening?
Doctors and medical staff recently said they saw patients go by with a strange reaction on their arm, according to KDKA (via Boston.com).
One woman described the reaction as if someone had taken a bandage off her arm.
- “It was a big rectangle, 2 1/2 to 3 inches long, maybe 1 1/2 to 2 inches wide,” said patient Genese Hendrickson to KDKA. “He left that mark where it would be bubbled and red. Itched. “
Dr. James DeAngelo, who works for Allergy and Clinical Immunology Associates, told KDKA that this is a normal reaction when receiving the vaccine.
- “It is some kind of immune reaction,” he said. “Technically, it is not an allergy. It is a hypersensitivity. We just don’t know the mechanism yet. “
That said, some men reported seeing their spot become oval, hard and hot. But it seems that the reaction subsides in a week.
Wait, isn’t that a ‘COVID arm’?
This is not entirely new. I wrote about this reaction – which was dubbed the “COVID arm” – in February. At the time, people reported seeing red lesions on their arms after receiving Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine, according to Health.com. The rash would develop near the injection site in the arm.
- “Many people called me about the injection site, and sometimes it extends up and down the arm as well,” Dr. John Swartzberg, an infectious disease specialist at the University of California, Berkeley School of Public Health, said KOMO News.
Experts said the reaction is called “delayed skin hypersensitivity”, according to Health.com. The rash is a sign of a late reaction to the injection.
But Dr. George Morris told CBS Minnesota that there is no cause for concern.
- “We saw reactions like that, even with other vaccines,” he said. “We know that when you get a flu shot, many people have a local reaction in their arms. Vaccines against tetanus. Tiles vaccines. “