CHRISTOPHER OGHENEBRORIE Okotie, a Nigerian televangelist and the pastor of the Household of God Church International Ministries in a viral video claimed that taking the COVID-19 vaccine will turn people into vampire.
Pastor Okotie made this claim in a video published here and also reported by some major Nigerian blogs like, Thisnigeria.com, blogtrent.com, tori.ng as well as SaharaReporters.
An excerpt from the video read:
… and you take the vaccine, you have entered into communion with Lucifer and that communion involves blood.
Since the blood of Jesus is not what it needs, it will require you to seek blood somewhere else.
And the only place you can find blood is another human being. So one of the things that the vaccine will make you do is to become a vampire who needs to drink blood for sustenance.
Chris is not the first clergy to make spurious comments about COVID-19 and its vaccine.
THE CLAIM
COVID-19 vaccine will turn human recipients’ to vampire.
THE FINDINGS
The FactCheckHub findings show that the claim is FALSE.
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), Vaccines work in training and preparing the body’s natural defense, otherwise known as the immune system to recognise in order to fight and battle any targeted virus or bacteria.
The WHO also stated that “vaccines are a critical new tool in the battle against COVID-19 and it is hugely encouraging to see so many vaccines proving successful and going into development.”
Although, some minor side effects of the vaccine have been reported thereby forcing some countries to stop its administration but there has never been a record of the vaccine turning anyone into a vampire.
The WHO stated that the side effects of COVID-19 vaccines have been mild and moderate so far.
The reported effects of the vaccines so far according to WHO are: fever, fatigue, headache, muscle pain, chills, diarrhoea, and pain at the injection site, becoming a vampire is not one of them.
Similarly, a WHO Infection, Prevention and Control Expert, Prof Adebola Olayinka told The FactCheckHub that vaccine generally does not change the genetic makeup of the body and it is untrue that vaccine can turn people into vampire.
She added that the various COVID-19 vaccines that are in circulation are meant to generate an immune response against COVID-19 infection.
Basically, the various COVID-19 vaccines that are available are products that are meant to generate an immune response against the potential COVID-19 infection and that has been the basis for any form of vaccination and it is not different for the COVID vaccine.
A fact-check has earlier debunked, here, a claim that the vaccine will change the recipients’ genetic make up.
THE VERDICT
The claim that that the COVID-19 vaccine recipients’ will turn people into vampires is FALSE.