Thread by @andrew_croxford, NEW THREAD: possible development of anti-Syncytin responses after immunization with the SARS-CoV-2 [...]

NEW THREAD: possible development of anti-Syncytin responses after immunization with the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein-coding mRNA vaccines, based on a "homologous" region shared between these proteins.

Syncytin-1 is involved in human placenta function.
The hypothesis: we may inadvertently induce an immune response against this particular protein, resulting in fertility issues after immunization with the new Pfizer/BioNTech or Moderna vaccine.
https://www.uniprot.org/uniprot/Q9UQF0

As always, I will represent the hypothesis in good faith. Nothing is ever solved completely. The exchange which got me interested was scientific in nature, so well done all involved.
Go back and look it over for context. https://twitter.com/BallouxFrancois/status/1334264523050594307?s=20

https://twitter.com/BallouxFrancois/status/1334264523050594307?s=20

Let’s look at the proteins. If anyone wants join in, I will leave the reference sequences and links to the tools used:
SARS-CoV-2 S Protein: https://www.uniprot.org/uniprot/P0DTC2
Syncytin 1: https://www.uniprot.org/uniprot/Q9UQF0

You can scroll down on these, pages, bang the ‘FASTA’ button to get the sequence, and then head over to https://web.expasy.org/sim/ to align the sequences, copy/paste the sequences into the boxes where indicated, then submit the query.
Give it a go.

After aligning, we see the region of interest in the black box and mentioned in this tweet from Dr. Yeadon. You can see the five amino acids in question. His concern is potential cross-reactivity.

This doesn’t strike me as a problem.
Let me demonstrate something for you…

What if I just select random human proteins and align with the spike from SARS-CoV-2?

Let’s start with actin. Small-ish, abundant, found in many cells and tissues. Here the sequence I aligned with the SARS-CoV-2 spike, and the results I obtained.
https://www.uniprot.org/uniprot/P60709

Let’s do another. How about collagen (COL1A1)? Again, we find a four of five amino acids aligning.
https://www.uniprot.org/uniprot/P02452

Another? Hemoglobin (HGB1)? Ambitious, because it’s a small protein so the chance of finding homologous regions is lower.
https://www.uniprot.org/uniprot/P69891

OK.... you find a similar regions of homology.

You can do this … all … day. A protein sequence of 1273 amino acids (like the S protein from SARS-CoV-2) will align with another to this degree with high probability, again and again, throughout our proteome and across all species.

If our immune systems couldn’t distinguish between proteins with this minute level of homology, we would fall ill shortly after birth from infection-induced systemic autoimmunity.

Large swathes of our proteome will align to this degree with countless microbial proteins.

We also have mechanisms (central tolerance) to prevent this. TCRs and BCRs are ‘negatively selected’ to delete potentially autoreactive lymphocytes.

Here's a guy with this point of view who I agree with, but he is more forward. https://twitter.com/ArisKatzourakis/status/1334436081761181697?s=20

https://twitter.com/ArisKatzourakis/status/1334436081761181697?s=20

If you think I ‘selected a few proteins that worked’ to make a point, I didn’t.

I selected our three most abundant proteins from the top of the list:

Collagen - 2kg per person
Hemoglobin - 800g per person
Actin - 700g per person

If these vaccines were to induce autoimmune responses against actin, hemoglobin and collagen, it would have been seen in the trials and trust me, fertility will be the last of our problems.

You will find even higher degrees of homology in hundreds, maybe thousands of proteins.

I suppose the experiments to answer Dr. Yeadon's concern would be feasible in vitro (pull down experiments with convalescent serum and recombinant syncytin-1, perhaps?) I just doubt they will be considered worth doing based on this homology.

With that aside, I want to move to something else that I find contradictory, and quite troubling in fact. This goes to the heart of the matter.

Here we go, a big point……

Infection with SARS-CoV-2 induces cellular and humoral (T&B) responses against the spike protein.

The NATURAL infection does this.
The vaccine does this.

Here one of a thousand papers on the topic… https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0092867420315658

Functional SARS-CoV-2-specific immune memory persists after mild COVID-19

The SARS-CoV-2 virus is causing a global pandemic and cases continue to rise. Most infected individuals experience mildly symptomatic coronavirus dise…

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0092867420315658

In other words, men and women will mount polyclonal T and B cell responses recognizing multiple epitopes of the spike protein after infection. Among those, potentially specificities that include this VVLQN / VVNQN-containing region...

How can one campaign for spread of SARS-CoV-2 among younger, low risk people, who develop anti-spike T and B cell responses, while simultaneously claiming that a response to the SAME PROTEIN may render you transiently infertile if induced via vaccination?

As always, bang that RT, pile in with your thoughts and I will get back to as many of you as possible. Please use this thread to support any women who have heard they won't be able to conceive after vaccination.

I could have just RT'd this.

https://twitter.com/BallouxFrancois/status/1334281918507053064?s=20

https://twitter.com/BallouxFrancois/status/1334281918507053064?s=20

@ENirenberg has written a very detailed article looking at this question. If you have stumbled across this thread, made it this far and are still interested, why not carry on with this article?... https://edwardnirenberg.medium.com/are-covid-19-vaccines-going-to-cause-infertility-939bbdb62b64

Are COVID-19 Vaccines Going To Cause Infertility?

Did you know that the reason that eutherians (placental mammals) have a placenta is because of several retrovirus infections? They gave us…

https://edwardnirenberg.medium.com/are-covid-19-vaccines-going-to-cause-infertility-939bbdb62b64

And this also..... ;) https://twitter.com/andrew_croxford/status/1336710866486636546