DeFreece trusts vaccine technology

NEBRASKA CITY - As Nebraska City enters the first month of the new year, one of the biggest problems from 2020 is still looking for a solution -- COVID-19.

The virus was the talk of the Nebraska City Tourism and Commerce’s Hot Topics forum, where school administrators and Dr. Dan DeFreece of CHI Health St. Mary's provided updates.

The current vaccine is classified as Messenger RNA. It uses genetic material to instruct cells to produce a protein that will trigger an immune response that equips the body to destroy the actual virus that causes COVID-19.

Dr. DeFreece assures people, who are getting the vaccines, that they are not guinea pigs. 

DeFreece: “The process of developing vaccines based on synthetic antigens has been going on well over 10 years. The mRNA specific vaccines have been worked on for several years now.”

DeFreece: “The research, the thinking and the technology has been going on for a while. The way I understand it is they took that technology and that research and retooled it toward this specific vaccine.”

According to Dr. DeFreece, the retooling for the vaccine has worked wonders in comparison to other viruses with a current 94 percent effectiveness rate.

DeFreece: “Anything you get over 90 percent in medicine as far as a treatment is remarkable. If you compare that to the flu vaccine and other vaccines that we feel good about 60 percent or so.”

Dr. DeFreece encourages anyone who is on the fence about getting the vaccine to do some research. You can find more information about the COVID vaccine at CHI health dot com or the CDC website.

https://www.chihealth.com/

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/different-vaccines/mrna.html