WASHINGTON — The COVID-19 vaccine rollout in the United States continues to outpace the rest of the world. Medical professionals have given more than 140 million doses.
But that does not mean there isn’t skepticism about the shots. Rumors online continue to circulate claiming the vaccine causes infertility in men and women.
Question:
Do the COVID-19 vaccines cause infertility?
Answer:
No.
Our Sources:
Dr. Tony Scialli, a reproduction and toxicology expert who teaches at Georgetown University’s Graduate School and George Washington University Medical School. Andrea Carcelen PhD, a vaccines expert from Johns Hopkins University.
What We Found:
To be clear, the answer is ‘no.’ The vaccines do not cause infertility.
The CDC has a web page dedicated to questions for people who are preparing for pregnancy. Right at the top it points out the COVID-19 vaccines do not cause fertility issues.
“The vaccines for COVID are designed to not to affect the reproductive system,” Carcelen said.
“There are no vaccines that interfere with fertility, neither are there vaccines that in theory might interfere with fertility,” Dr. Scialli said.
We asked both: How do we know the vaccines don’t affect reproduction?
“The vaccine is very specific and one of the ways they work is by causing the body to make antibodies specifically against certain proteins and those are proteins that are involved in the infection,” Dr. Scialli said.
“So the immune system is trained to recognize just that part,” Carcelen added.
“There is no damage to our own proteins (to our own native proteins) which might be involved in fertility or any other aspect of reproduction,” Dr. Scialli finished.
Our experts pointed out in addition to the COVID-19 vaccines, no vaccines approved in the United States cause issues with fertility.
"Vaccines don't cause infertility," Dr. Scialli went on to say. "But there's also no mechanism that would suggest, that theoretically, they could cause infertility."
To wrap it up for you. No, the vaccines do not affect fertility in men or women. The vaccines are specifically designed to deal only with COVID-19 proteins-and do not damage our own proteins.
As far as pregnancy goes, according to our experts, thousands of pregnant women have already been immunized and their cases are being studied by researchers. But so far there is no link between the vaccine and issues with pregnancies.