New 'Er' blood group is not proof Covid-19 vaccines alter DNA

New 'Er' blood group is not proof Covid-19 vaccines alter DNA

(Reuters) - A recently discovered blood group system called Er is not proof that mRNA in Covid-19 vaccines is changing people’s DNA, as some social media users have claimed. Scientists told Reuters that Er has always existed and antigens from the blood group were first discovered more than 40 years ago.

“A 44th blood group has been discovered in the UK and confirmed in at least 30 people over the last couple months,” a woman says in an Instagram video that received over 3,000 likes at the time of writing. She goes on to suggest that Covid vaccines are responsible for the creation of Er - “Is it really a new blood type or is this vaccine injury and mRNA that’s not supposed to be changing our DNA?” (here)

The claim stems from news in September that scientists at University of Bristol and the National Health Services Blood and Transplant (NHSBT) “discovered a rare new blood group system,” (here) (here).

Stephen Bailey, a spokesperson for the NHSBT, told Reuters via email that though Er was newly discovered, that did not mean it was new. “It was always there. We just didn’t know how different elements were related and that they together formed a system. Er is the 44th blood group system to be discovered. New blood group systems have been regularly discovered for decades.”

Bailey said: “One of the antigens that make up the blood group system was discovered more than 40 years ago. The research established that some known antigens, and some newly found antigens are actually part of a blood group system.”

Dr. Timothy Satchwell, a research associate at the University of Bristol and one of the lead authors on the research paper, said in an email that the first Er antigen was reported in 1982.

“There is absolutely no evidence whatsoever to support the claim made, which has no basis in logic or scientific fact, particularly given that the first observations of these antigenic variants were made in the 1980s, prior to Covid and many of the samples in our work are from archived frozen material from many years ago,” Satchwell said.

The research paper itself also states that Er antigens were first identified nearly 40 years ago (here).

Ash Toye, another author of the paper on Er and professor of cell biology at the University of Bristol, also told Reuters that there is no evidence to link the existence of Er to mRNA in Covid vaccines.

Previous Reuters Fact Checks have debunked claims that mRNA vaccines change recipients’ DNA (here), (here), (here).

VERDICT

False. The existence of the blood group Er does not suggest that mRNA vaccines are changing people’s blood types or DNA. Antigens from the blood group Er were first discovered 40 years ago.