The first jab of Sputnik V in India was administered on Friday in Hyderabad. This gives people three vaccine options to choose from.
Scientists around the world are keeping an eye on the side effects of these vaccines and have confirmed that none are serious. All the three vaccines approved in India — Covaxin, Covishield and Sputnik — have mild side effects.
Here’s the list of side effects which are observed in the past:
Sputnik V
The Russian vaccine Sputnik V is a combination of two different adenoviruses- Ad26 and Ad5-viruses that cause common cold, with SARS-CoV-2. This combination prompts the body for antibody creation and hence causes mild inflammatory reactions, the symptoms of which might include headache, fatigue, pain at the injection site, and flu-like illness.
No serious side effects have been recorded after taking the Sputnik V shot. There have been instances of hypertension, hemorrhagic stroke, and thrombosis, but there’s no confirmation of the vaccine shot being the reason behind it.
Covaxin
The first indigenous vaccine, Covaxin uses an inactive SARS-CoV-2 antigen strain to teach the body how to react when a real Covid-19 virus enters the body. People have reported side effects like redness, swelling, pain at the injection site, fever, sweating and/ or chills, malaise, body ache, nausea and vomiting, itching and rashes, and headache.
As of now, serious side effects have not been reported by anyone who has taken the shots.
Covishield
The Oxford-Astrazeneca Covid-19 vaccine, Covishield, is used in over 62 countries around the world. In this vaccine, Covid-19 virus-like spikes are added to a dead version of the fever-causing virus in Chimpanzee. This makes the body assume it to be a Covid-19 virus and then it builds antibody against it. The side effects after a shot may include pain at the injection site, redness, moderate or high fever, drowsiness and lethargy, arm stiffness, and body ache.
In this vaccine, some serious side effects like blood clots have been reported but have been found to be very rare.