*Deep breath* Tweeting about vaccine safety can be scary because sometimes the conversations aren't cordial, and people can be meaner on the internet than IRL. But I'm going to try it anyway...

"What's going on with this allergy thing in the UK?"
-2 people who received the vaccine in the UK had an allergic reaction of the kind you might expect if you have a nut allergy and eat nuts and then your tongue swells up or you have some trouble breathing.

"Are they OK?"
-Yes! They are both recovering. They both carry Epi-Pen type devices because they have had severe allergic reactions before, to other stuff.

"Did we see this outcome in clinical trials?"
-The clinical trial notes say that these events were rare in both the treatment (0.6%) and the control (0.5%) groups. But we still monitor these types of things very very carefully after vaccines become available!

"Is this going to happen to me when I get vaccinated?"
-Almost definitely no, especially if you've never had a severe allergic reaction.

"How do we know about these two people?"
-We take vaccine safety so seriously that we have established these lightning-quick safety monitoring systems. They help us find outcomes like this super-fast. This is exactly how those systems are supposed to work!

"Did this happen because of the vaccine?"
-Doctors & scientists are investigating this carefully right now. The current guidance in Canada is that if you are allergic to any components in the vaccine, to hold off getting the vaccine for now.

"Has your opinion of the safety of this vaccine changed?"
-No, not based on this information. I'm still really psyched to get vaccinated when the vaccine is available for me!