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1000s Have Developed Tinnitus After Covid Shots

Posted on May 16, 2023



Dr Mercola

Story at-a-glance

• At least 16,183 people say they’ve developed tinnitus after receiving a COVID-19 shot, and this is likely an underestimate
  
• Dr. Konstantina Stankovic, director of the Stanford Medicine Molecular Neurotology Laboratory, is leading research to uncover how COVID-19 and COVID-19 shots may be affecting auditory function and triggering tinnitus
  
• She says her email is bombarded with reports from people who developed tinnitus after getting a COVID-19 shot
  
• Dr. Gregory Poland, director of the Mayo Clinic’s Vaccine Research Group in Rochester, Minnesota, also developed tinnitus after a COVID-19 shot; he’s been suffering from tinnitus for two years as a result and says he receives emails nearly every day from people with similar stories
  
• Molecular mimicry, which occurs when similarities between different antigens confuse the immune system, is one potential mechanism that could explain the link between COVID-19 shots and tinnitus
  

At least 16,183 people say they’ve developed tinnitus after receiving a COVID-19 shot.^1,2 The reports were filed with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) database. But considering only between 1%³ and 10%⁴ of adverse reactions are ever reported to VAERS, the actual number is likely much higher.
Tinnitus causes a perception of sound in the ear without an external source. While the sound is often described as ringing in the ears, it can also be a whistling, buzzing, hissing, clicking, swooshing or roaring sensation. In rare cases, it can even sound like music.⁵ An estimated 10% to 25% of adults, as well as children, suffer from tinnitus of varying degrees.⁶
Of the approximately 25 million Americans who live with tinnitus, 5 million have chronic tinnitus that’s burdensome while 2 million describe the condition as debilitating.⁷ Now, with so many people developing tinnitus after COVID-19 shots, theories have emerged about the possible connection.

Shots May Trigger Chronic Inflammation, Other Risk Factors

Shaowen Bao, an associate professor at the University of Arizona, Tucson, who’s also a representative of the American Tinnitus Association’s scientific advisory board, has been researching tinnitus for more than 10 years. He’s also a tinnitus sufferer. A support group on social media created for people who developed tinnitus after a COVID-19 shot contacted Bao to study the potential link.
He surveyed 398 people from the group, who tended to suffer from severe tinnitus along with symptoms such as headaches, dizziness, vertigo, ear pain, anxiety and depression.⁸
While Bao is still analyzing his findings, he told NBC News that tinnitus tended to develop after the first dose of a COVID-19 shot, suggesting “the vaccine is interacting with preexisting risk factors for tinnitus. If you have the risk factor, you will probably get it from the first dose.”⁹ He also suggested chronic inflammation in the brain or spinal cord could be involved.
The CDC also looked into a link between COVID-19 shots and tinnitus. The agency said it didn’t find any connection, but their review hasn’t been made public.¹⁰ Dr. Harlan Krumholz, director of the Center for Outcomes Research and Evaluation at Yale University, is also studying tinnitus as it relates to COVID-19 shots and long COVID, as part of the Yale LISTEN study.¹¹
“Tinnitus is a prominent symptom in many people with long COVID and in those with vaccine-associated conditions,” he told USA Today.¹² “We are seeking to bring together many people with this symptom and hope we can learn together what might be the cause — on the path toward evidence-based strategies to help these people.”
Dr. Konstantina Stankovic, an otolaryngologist-head and neck surgeon who directs the Stanford Medicine Molecular Neurotology Laboratory, is also leading research to uncover how COVID-19 and COVID-19 shots may be affecting auditory function — and whether tinnitus is a side effect of the shots.
“My email is being bombarded by people from across the world who really feel that they don’t have a voice,” she told NBC News. “They feel that they’re being dismissed, that people don’t take them seriously, and yet they tell me in very moving ways how they can tie it to the vaccine.”¹³

Vaccine Proponent Gets Tinnitus After COVID-19 Shot

While media and health officials alike often brush off anecdotal reports of vaccine reactions, when Dr. Gregory Poland developed tinnitus after a COVID-19 shot, people took notice.
Poland is the director of the Mayo Clinic’s Vaccine Research Group in Rochester, Minnesota. He’s also a paid scientific adviser for Johnson & Johnson and a vaccine development consultant for Moderna and other pharmaceutical companies.¹⁴ When the tinnitus first struck — on his drive home from his second COVID-19 shot, “It startled me,” Poland said. “I thought it was a dog whistle going off right next to me.”¹⁵
Poland has been suffering from tinnitus for two years and says he receives emails nearly every day from people who say they also developed tinnitus after a COVID-19 shot. He says he’s frustrated by the CDC’s lack of action on the issue. “Why has the CDC not done all of the research that they should do on this and published it?” he stated to NBC News.¹⁶
Some days, he says, the tinnitus is so bad “I could just scream … You don’t ever get over tinnitus.”¹⁷ It’s unusual that a person of Poland’s background and close ties to Big Pharma would speak out about vaccine-induced tinnitus. But he told NBC News, “I refuse to be anything less than transparent. I refuse to cherry-pick the information that should be presented to people to make good decisions.”¹

Is Molecular Mimicry Behind Shot-Induced Tinnitus?

A review published in the Annals of Medicine & Surgery looked at the potential mechanisms behind vaccine-associated-tinnitus.¹⁹ Molecular mimicry is one possibility. It occurs when similarities between different antigens confuse the immune system.
There are often significant similarities between elements in the vaccine and human proteins, which can lead to immune cross-reactivity. When this occurs, researchers explained in Cellular & Molecular Immunology, “… the reaction of the immune system towards the pathogenic antigens may harm the similar human proteins, essentially causing autoimmune disease.”²⁰
In relation to COVID-19 shots, specifically, researchers wrote in the Journal of Autoimmunity, “Indeed, antibodies against the spike protein S1 of SARS-CoV-2 had a high affinity against some human tissue proteins. As vaccine mRNA codes the same viral protein, they can trigger autoimmune diseases in predisposed patients.”²¹ The Annals of Medicine & Surgery researchers explained:²²

“Based on the mechanisms behind other COVID-19 vaccine-induced disorders and the phenomenon of molecular mimicry, a cross-reactivity between anti-spike SARS-CoV-2 antibodies and otologic antigens is a possibility. The heptapeptide resemblance between coronavirus spike glycoprotein and numerous human proteins further supports molecular mimicry as a potential mechanism behind such vaccine-induced disorders.

Several autoimmune conditions, including vaccine-induced thrombotic thrombocytopenia (VITT) and Guillain-Barré syndrome (GBS), have been reported following coronavirus vaccination. Anti-spike antibodies may potentially react with antigens anywhere along the auditory pathway and initiate an inflammatory reaction involving the tympanic membrane, ossicular chain, cochlea, cochlear vessels, organ of Corti, etc.”

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Via https://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2023/05/16/tinnitus-covid-vaccine.aspx/

THANKS TO: https://stuartbramhall.wordpress.com/2023/05/16/1000s-have-developed-tinnitus-after-covid-shots/