Read the original article on Best Life. Ibuprofen is sold under brand names like Advil and Motrin, while acetaminophen is sold under the brand name Tylenol, among others. You might take these over-the-counter drugs to help you address day-to-day discomfort or maybe you were planning to take some before your shot in anticipation of the vaccine’s potential side effects. But there is one important reason experts suggest avoiding these medications before your immunization: they could blunt your body’s immune response.ae0fcc31ae342fd3a1346ebb1f342fcb And for more up-to-date COVID news delivered straight to your inbox, sign up for our daily newsletter. Although the COVID vaccine’s interaction with ibuprofen or acetaminophen hasn’t yet been studied, experts surmise what could occur if the two collided. The University of California Irvine warns that “taking over-the-counter medications such as acetaminophen and ibuprofen before receiving a COVID vaccine may reduce its ability to work and blunt your immune response to the vaccine.” That’s because “these OTC medications work as anti-inflammatories and block a pathway called the cyclooxygenase-2 (cox-2) enzyme,” says Ashley Ellis, PharmD, director of clinical operations for Compwell. These enzymes are necessary for your body to be able to produce a high volume of “B-lymphocytes, which downstream make antibodies to COVID, the flu, or whichever pathogen the vaccine is trying to protect against.” To find out what another expert just said about the vaccine, check out Dr. Fauci Just Gave This Warning About COVID Vaccine Side Effects. If these enzymes are blocked, your body is less likely to be able to produce the necessary antibodies in response to the vaccine, which could potentially make the it less effective in protecting you should you become infected with COVID later on. “You want the immune system to see the antigen (the vaccine) and respond to it. Doing so is how your immune system creates antibodies and cells that can kill the virus if seen again after getting the vaccine,” says Jason Reed, PharmD, founder of BestRxforSavings. “Therefore, the concern is using these drugs prior to getting the vaccine would mute this immune response and possibly interfere with building the defense.” And to see what the CDC had to say about the current outbreak in the U.S., check out The CDC Just Issued This Grim Warning About the COVID Surge. There are plenty of similarities between COVID and the flu and how they present in patients, which is why a study that found that taking ibuprofen or acetaminophen did affect patients’ immune response to the flu vaccine is particularly noteworthy. One of the authors of the 2015 study out of the University of Rochester Medical Center, David J. Topham, PhD, advised in a statement that “unless your health care provider tells you otherwise, it’s best not to take pain relievers one or two days before the flu vaccine” because doing so “can dilute the power of the vaccine.” To see if you could currently have COVID, check out If This Part of Your Body Hurts, You Could Have COVID.
