Prior studies suggest that adverse events (AEs) following doses one and two of BNT162b2/Pfizer vaccine are worse in those with a prior history of COVID-19. To establish whether this outcome applies to a third/booster dose, we conducted a survey with 534 healthcare workers (HCW) in Northeast England, who reported AEs following all three doses of BNT162b2/Pfizer vaccine. We also explored AEs associated with concurrent seasonal influenza immunisation, in a subset of 492 HCWs. For all doses of BNT162b2/Pfizer vaccine there was a cluster of systemic AEs that were consistently worse in HCWs with a prior history of COVID-19. AEs were no worse in HCWs who received their third/booster dose within 7 days of the influenza jab, rather than further apart. Gender and the presence of ongoing COVID-19 symptoms (OCS) had no effect on AEs associated with COVID-19 or influenza vaccination, though younger HCWs experienced more AEs overall. Our findings have implications for vaccine hesitancy and immunisation protocols.
Copyright: © 2023 Raw et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.