Some people have been experiencing an annoying but not life threatening skin reaction to their COVID-19 vaccine.
Dr. Esther Freeman is the Director of global health dermatology at Massachusetts General Hospital and principal investigator for the international COVID-19 Dermatology Registry.
She and her colleagues investigated hundreds of reports of different skin reactions that people experienced after getting either the Pfizer or Moderna COVID-19 vaccines.
One possible side effect they have noticed is people reporting a bright red and potentially swollen or tender patch on their arm which can develop days after the vaccine.
"I think sometimes this has been misdiagnosed as an infection and people have really worried," said Dr. Freeman.
This reaction has primarily been associated with the Moderna vaccine although there have been some reports after the Pfizer vaccine as well.
There have also been some rare, full body reactions that can look like a rash and even reports of people developing so-called "COVID toes." This presents as swelling or discoloration on the toes, which can be a side effect of COVID-19 and is also now showing up as a reaction to the vaccine.
Dr. Freeman explained that while these reactions can be uncomfortable, they do not appear to be serious or indicative of an underlying issue.
"We think the rashes are coming from your immune response to the vaccine, which is why I say it’s not necessarily a bad thing if you get a rash after the vaccine. It means your body is mounting an immune response to the vaccine, which is ultimately what we want."
Dr. Freeman added no one in their study developed a serious reaction and the symptoms went away after a few hours to weeks.
"They’re certainly uncomfortable; no one likes to have a rash and certainly being itchy is not comfortable. But I think what we found in our data, which is really reassuring is that as long as you didn’t have an immediate allergic reaction - which of course is very rare - as long as this started four hours or more after vaccination, people do incredibly well."
She said people should contact their doctor to report the symptoms but otherwise not to worry.
"We just wanted to reassure everyone that that can happen and it’s just a delayed reaction to the vaccine."
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