Rishard Khan and

An­na-Lisa Paul

“I don’t think my ex­pe­ri­ence should dis­cour­age any­one from be­ing vac­ci­nat­ed or hav­ing their kids vac­ci­nat­ed.”

That was the view of Tahi­rah Mo­hammed, 17, who suf­fered a case of ana­phy­lac­tic shock af­ter get­ting the Pfiz­er vac­cine on Au­gust 18 at the COSTAATT Cam­pus in El Do­ra­do, Tu­na­puna.

“Not every­one is go­ing to re­act the same way, and not every­one is go­ing to have the same re­ac­tion I did.”

Ana­phy­lac­tic shock is a rare but se­vere al­ler­gic re­ac­tion that can be dead­ly if not treat­ed right away. It’s most of­ten caused by an al­ler­gy to food, in­sect bites, or cer­tain med­ica­tions.

It caus­es the im­mune sys­tem to re­lease a flood of chem­i­cals that can send a per­son in­to shock as blood pres­sure drops and air­ways nar­row - block­ing breath­ing. Signs and symp­toms in­clude a rapid, weak pulse; a skin rash; and nau­sea and vom­it­ing.

Pfiz­er is the on­ly vac­cine so far ap­proved by the World Health Or­gan­i­sa­tion (WHO) for use in chil­dren 12 years and old­er.

“On the pos­i­tive side, every­thing is be­ing tak­en care of,” Mo­hammed told Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day.

She said she was hap­py when she heard that stu­dents would have the op­por­tu­ni­ty to be vac­ci­nat­ed.

“I was pret­ty ex­cit­ed be­cause I know my his­to­ry and my med­ical con­di­tions, and I thought it was nec­es­sary for me to be vac­ci­nat­ed.”

Af­ter tak­ing it, how­ev­er, she be­gan feel­ing the ad­verse re­ac­tion.

“I start­ed feel­ing like I was go­ing to pass out. I start­ed feel­ing like my throat and air­ways were clos­ing in,” she re­called.

Un­able to re­mem­ber much of any­thing af­ter that, Mo­hammed praised the health­care of­fi­cials who were present.

“They were my su­per­heroes and I want to say hats off to them. They did an ab­solute­ly amaz­ing job with me and they knew how to take care of my sit­u­a­tion and I am so grate­ful for that,” she said.

“They weren’t too pleased with my blood pres­sure be­cause that was pret­ty low, see­ing that is al­so a side ef­fect of the Pfiz­er vac­cine.”

Point­ing to a par­tic­u­lar com­pound con­tained in the Pfiz­er vac­cine which she knew could have sent her in­to ana­phy­lac­tic shock, Mo­hammed said, “I knew that could hap­pen to me and I could end up in that sit­u­a­tion.”

Al­though she has suf­fered with asth­ma be­fore, she had nev­er ex­pe­ri­enced ana­phy­lax­is.

Asked why she will­ing­ly opened her­self up to the pos­si­bil­i­ty of this hap­pen­ing, the out­spo­ken young woman ex­plained, “I have had my right lung al­most fail me twice so I knew if I had con­tract­ed COVID-19, the pos­si­bil­i­ty of me ac­tu­al­ly sur­viv­ing that and know­ing the long-term side ef­fects that it could leave, I re­al­ly didn’t want to risk that and put my­self in that sit­u­a­tion.

TAHIRAH MOHAMMED

“I al­so deemed it nec­es­sary to risk tak­ing the vac­cine so I could have some form of im­mu­ni­ty if I do get COVID-19.”

Asked if she in­tend­ed to move ahead with plans to take her sec­ond dose of the vac­cine, she said doc­tors from the Min­istry of Health who were speak­ing with the fam­i­ly were look­ing in­to it.

Once she is cleared by doc­tors to re­ceive her sec­ond dose of the vac­cine, Mo­hammed said she will ac­cept know­ing if an­oth­er such in­ci­dent was to oc­cur, the med­ical team will know how to re­act and treat her.

Com­ment­ing on the pos­i­tive mes­sages, as well as the neg­a­tive back­lash she and her fam­i­ly had been re­ceiv­ing, Mo­hammed said, “Peo­ple are be­ing very judg­men­tal on the fact that it’s my fam­i­ly and my de­ci­sion to be vac­ci­nat­ed, and they re­al­ly have their own per­spec­tive and opin­ions and they took the en­tire video out of con­text and came up with their own neg­a­tive stuff about the post.”

As a mi­nor whose par­ents stand with her, Mo­hammed said, “That was our choice and it should not have af­fect­ed any­one, but we have had grown adults telling me I should have died.”

Fight­ing back the tears, she re­vealed, “It has been a lit­tle hard for my mum be­cause she isn’t used to this…be­ing on so­cial me­dia and the back­lash and it’s def­i­nite­ly tak­en a toll on her.”

Mo­hammed said her par­ents had sac­ri­ficed so much for her and even know­ing what they could have faced as a fam­i­ly unit – they took the de­ci­sion to­geth­er.

“It is wrong for grown peo­ple to tell a mi­nor she should have died and leav­ing all these neg­a­tive com­ments about me, it is re­al­ly dis­ap­point­ing,” she added.

To those us­ing her in­ci­dent as a bench­mark to turn away from vac­cines, Mo­hammed urged them to get a med­ical check-up with their doc­tor pri­or and to put their trust in the med­ical pro­fes­sion­als’ abil­i­ties to re­act and re­spond pos­i­tive­ly.

Oth­er Stu­dents Hap­py To Be Vac­ci­nat­ed

Even in the face of Mo­hammed’s rare al­ler­gic re­ac­tion, sev­er­al oth­er stu­dents and their par­ents have ex­pressed joy at the chance to be vac­ci­nat­ed.

Sa­van­nah Dabiesingh, 12, of Preysal High School said, “I was very hap­py that we were get­ting the Pfiz­er and that chil­dren could take the vac­cine. I read up about it for my­self and it is a good vac­cine be­cause it can pre­vent you from get­ting the Delta vari­ant.”

Vac­ci­nat­ed at the Ato Boldon Sta­di­um, Cou­va on Au­gust 21 - Dabiesingh is head­ed in­to Form Two when school re­opens on Sep­tem­ber 6.

Dur­ing a vir­tu­al in­ter­view yes­ter­day, she said vac­ci­na­tion was some­thing she had been look­ing for­ward to - and four days af­ter she was vac­ci­nat­ed, she has not ex­pe­ri­enced any side ef­fects thus far.

Ex­cept for the ini­tial pain at the in­jec­tion site, Dabiesingh claimed she, “ac­tu­al­ly felt bet­ter af­ter get­ting the vac­cine.”

She said some of her friends had al­ready been vac­ci­nat­ed while sev­er­al more were plan­ning to.

De­spite the hype on so­cial me­dia which she ini­tial­ly ad­mit­ted was off-putting, Dabiesingh said, “The first time when they were say­ing bad things about the vac­cine, it was re­al­ly scary and I didn’t want to take it. But I read up on it and watched some videos on it. I learnt it just helps to pre­vent you from dy­ing if you get COVID.”

To oth­ers, in­clud­ing one of her cousins who is still hes­i­tant about be­ing vac­ci­nat­ed, she ad­vised, “Take it be­cause when you get it, it can help you to pre­vent you from get­ting the Delta vari­ant and even dy­ing from COVID.”

“It can help us to go back to school faster which is a good thing. To go to school in re­al, talk to your friends and have con­ver­sa­tions with your teach­ers….it is just bet­ter for every­body if you take the vac­cine.”

Denise Seepaul and her daughters Katrina 15 right, and Emily 16, left received the COVID-19 vaccine on Saturday.

She urged peo­ple to do their own re­search about vac­cines and not lis­ten to oth­ers.

It was much the same for sis­ters Cathe­ri­na Seep­aul, 15, and Emi­ly Seep­aul, 16, who at­tend Holy Faith Con­vent, Cou­va.

The two were al­so vac­ci­nat­ed on Au­gust 21, at the Ato Boldon Sta­di­um and de­scribed it as “a very smooth process” where “every­body was very nice.”

Emi­ly said, “I would love to go back out to school and I want to know there is some form of im­mu­ni­ty in me so that if I ac­tu­al­ly con­tract Covid, I would be able to fight it bet­ter.”

Their moth­er Denise Seep­aul claimed, “The kids made the de­ci­sion on their own.”

She ad­mit­ted, “I am def­i­nite­ly at peace. I know they have some form of pro­tec­tion.”

To the hes­i­tant, she en­cour­aged them, “To read and un­der­stand. Do not lis­ten to hearsay and them say, read up on vac­ci­na­tion and the dif­fer­ent vac­cines they of­fer.”

Nisha Man­groo took along her 12-year-old daugh­ter and 15-year-old son to the Cen­tre Pointe Mall, Ch­agua­nas on Au­gust 20 and was pleas­ant­ly sur­prised at the lev­el of ser­vice and ef­fi­cien­cy that was met­ed out to them.

Claim­ing her kids were quite ex­posed to so­cial me­dia, Man­groo said, “Al­though they trust­ed mum­my, they still had their doubts.”

How­ev­er, she said the med­ical pro­fes­sion­als were able to an­swer all their ques­tions and put their minds at ease.

While her daugh­ter, who wrote the Sec­ondary En­trance As­sess­ment (SEA) last year, has not seen her new school yet and with her son go­ing in­to Form Five and un­able to en­joy be­ing a typ­i­cal stu­dent, Man­groo said with all the neg­a­tiv­i­ty on so­cial me­dia, “We want to get vac­ci­nat­ed be­cause we want to be able to go out.”

She added, “They were re­al­ly hap­py that they could have got­ten the chance to have a vac­cine.”

Man­groo said pri­or to be­ing vac­ci­nat­ed, she “sift­ed through opin­ions, did read­ing and spoke to doc­tors and reached to peo­ple abroad about in­fec­tious dis­eases.”

Pe­di­a­tri­cian: The Pub­lic Should Not Be Wor­ried

Com­ment­ing on the un­for­tu­nate in­ci­dent, Pe­di­a­tri­cian Dr Marya­ma Al­leyne said this should not de­ter the pub­lic and, “It is not some­thing the gen­er­al pub­lic needs to wor­ry about.”

The sec­re­tary of the Pe­di­atric So­ci­ety of T&T, Al­leyne said al­ler­gies are com­mon as peo­ple re­act to dust and even med­ica­tions.

She con­tin­ued that while “al­ler­gies to vac­cines are very rare,” this is the first time this kind of re­ac­tion has been iden­ti­fied since vac­ci­na­tions be­gan in T&T.

Al­leyne urged every­one to con­tin­ue en­sur­ing they were ful­ly vac­ci­nat­ed.

Re­gard­ing cas­es of my­ocardi­tis which is in­flam­ma­tion of the heart, and peri­cardi­tis which is in­flam­ma­tion of the sleeve around the heart, Al­leyne said, “The chance of you get­ting my­ocardi­tis from the COVID in­fec­tion is much greater than you get­ting my­ocardi­tis from the Pfiz­er vac­cine.”