Fact Check: COVID-19 Vaccine Does Not Spread By Inhalation Or Skin Contact

A COVID-19 clinical trial protocol document by Pfizer admits that vaccinated people can ¡°shed¡± the vaccine, emitting materials that can spread to unvaccinated people by inhalation or skin contact.

However, this claim does not hold any merit.

According to an AP fact check, COVID-19 vaccines that are in use, including the Pfizer vaccine, cannot spread between people.

Posts making the false claim are misrepresenting standard language in the protocol document intended to protect pregnant women and monitor their potential exposure during clinical trials.

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Pfizer¡¯s COVID-19 vaccine does not shed from person to person, nor has the company admitted any such thing.

¡°The Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine is a synthetic mRNA vaccine and does not contain any virus particles. Because there is no virus produced in the body, no shedding occurs within the human body,¡± Pfizer spokesperson Jerica Pitts told The Associated Press in an email. ¡°The vaccine cannot be inhaled via shedding and can only enter the human body through an administered dose.¡±

The US Food and Drug Administration approved Pfizer¡¯s vaccine in December after extensive clinical trials. Women who were pregnant or breastfeeding were excluded from joining those early clinical studies, and participants were instructed to take measures to avoid pregnancy.

The false posts use a portion of a November clinical trial protocol document that addresses pregnant women to support the bogus theory that a vaccinated person can spread the vaccine or provoke supposed side effects in another person.

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The document says any exposures during pregnancy should be reported, and defines such cases broadly to include instances where a pregnant woman is exposed to the vaccine ¡°by inhalation or skin contact¡± or if a man who received the vaccine or was exposed to it ¡°then exposes his female partner prior to or around the time of conception.¡±

That language can be relevant to other kinds of vaccines, including certain ones that contain live viruses, said Dr. Justin Brandt, an assistant professor at the department of obstetrics, gynecology and reproductive sciences at Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School.