No, Vaccine Side Effects Don't Tell You How Well Your Immune System Will Protect You from COVID-19

upstart writes in with an IRC submission:

No, Vaccine Side Effects Don't Tell You How Well Your Immune System Will Protect You From Covid-19:

Your immune system responds to the foreign molecules that make up any vaccine via two different systems.

The initial response is due to what's called the innate immune response. This system is activated as soon as your cells notice you've been exposed to any foreign material, from a splinter to a virus. Its goal is to eliminate the invader. White blood cells called neutrophils and macrophages travel to the intruder and work to destroy it.

This first line of defense is relatively short-lived, lasting hours or days.

The second line of defense takes days to weeks to get up and running. This is the long-lasting adaptive immune response. It relies on your immune system's T and B cells that learn to recognize particular invaders, such as a protein from the coronavirus. If the invader is encountered again, months or even years in the future, it's these immune cells that will recognize the old enemy and start generating the antibodies that will take it down.

In the case of the SARS-CoV-2 vaccines, it takes approximately two weeks to develop the adaptive response that brings long-lasting protection against the virus.

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