Faster and higher immune responses among women are a thing, Elizabeth Tracey reports

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When women complain of pain and systemic side effects of vaccination, it’s not all in their heads. Abundant research shows that indeed, women do have different immune responses. That’s according to sex and immunity expert Sabra Klein at Johns Hopkins.

Nelson: It's not that females have a different immune system, it's not that they're mounting different immune responses, it is merely that the magnitude is just greater. The response starts to go up a little bit sooner so those early fast responding innate responses they come out of the gate faster, they initiate those slower responding cells and that response can stay elevated. I'm not gonna tell you that mounting a greater response is always better because it's not.  :29

The downside, Klein notes, to this accentuated immune response is those symptoms that feel flu-like, or fatigue, may last longer. They may also underpin the well-known phenomenon of autoimmune diseases impacting women more often. At Johns Hopkins, I’m Elizabeth Tracey.