How to abstain from alcohol after vaccination and whether to switch to non-alcoholic wine

There are natural foci of rabies in our country. They occur in areas where wild animals such as:

• wolves,
• foxes,
• raccoons,
• arctic foxes
• and jackals.

But there are also urban centers of rabies. Domestic animals in cities and rural livestock suffer. The carriers are mice, including bats (which have recently infested our cities), cats and dogs. Pets often become infected after contact with wild animals.

What is the rabies vaccine?

Rabies is a dangerous pathology that develops under the influence of pathogenic microorganisms Rabiesvirus. In most cases, infection occurs through direct contact with a sick animal, namely through a bite. If there is a suspicion of the penetration of pathogenic microorganisms, the victim should immediately contact a medical facility for vaccination. You need to act as soon as possible, because after 2 weeks the doctors will be powerless.

The rabies vaccine is based on rabies immunoglobulin and is a compound from the blood of a person or animal that has developed stable immunity. After the injection, the virus stops spreading throughout the body, and it becomes much easier for the immune system to overcome it. It is worth considering that after vaccination, immunity to the disease remains for a whole year.

Vaccine

All about vaccinations

Rabies virus (or rabies virus) is highly contagious. It can be transmitted from sick animals to people, after an aggressive attack on the part of the former, if only the animal’s saliva gets on a person’s skin. Not only wild animals, but also pets are dangerous. an infected can be dangerous . The virus is also transmitted through blood. Infection can occur:

• when inhaling air breathed by a sick animal,
• through food that it has touched or where its saliva may have entered,
• and also through the placenta to a baby during pregnancy from a sick mother.

An animal with rabies exhibits severe drooling and hydrophobia.

The first signs of damage can be considered:

• severe muscle pain,
• headaches of varying strength and localization,
• dizziness,
• violation of orientation in space.

This is a merciless virus. It kills one hundred percent of living things it comes into contact with. The speed of spread through nervous tissue can be rapid and reach three millimeters per hour. The incubation period lasts about three months.

In the absence of medical care, the patient's condition can rapidly deteriorate. He experiences limb spasms, develops paralysis, ending in coma. Prevention should be carried out as quickly as possible after possible contact. This will allow you to get ahead of the development of the virus. It multiplies in the nervous tissue, forming specific bodies. The virus moves through the body through an axon-neuron pair. When the virus reaches large nodes of nervous tissue, such as the spinal cord, it provokes inflammatory processes such as meningoencephalitis. The nervous tissue undergoes dystrophic and necrotic changes. If the virus reaches the brain, it will cause paralysis of the respiratory center.

When the symptoms of the disease are obvious, it is too late to help the patient.

Until now, no effective treatment for rabies has been discovered. The only reliable method is to prevent the development of the disease. In order to prevent development, everyone who may have had contact with a potentially dangerous animal is given a vaccine. A total of six injections are required. To prevent the development of rabies, the following means are used:

• kokav,
• indirab,
• kav,
• inactivated serum, etc.

The action of the serum is based on the production of immune bodies when a weakened pathogen is introduced into the patient’s body. The formation of stable immunity takes two weeks. To protect the patient’s body from the virus, the patient is injected with serum containing human or equine immunoglobulin.

It is necessary to be vaccinated against rabies within the first three days after contact with a potentially infected animal. People are vaccinated on the seventh, fourteenth, thirtieth, and ninetieth days. To do this, a person must contact a medical organization. The immune system will reach its maximum strength only after a year.

It is necessary to carefully monitor a sick animal. If it is still alive on the tenth day after the bite, then you should calm down - the virus might not have entered the body. The affected animal spreads the infection for seven or ten days before dying. So, if a sick animal is alive tens of days after contact, then it was not infectious. You don't have to get vaccinated anymore.

The vaccination has no medical restrictions or prohibitions on administration. Even if they were, the risk of death from rabies is so great that it more than exceeds the risks of developing any complications or allergic reactions. They even give the vaccine to:

• pregnant women and infants,
• old people and even newborns.

So can you drink alcohol after getting a rabies vaccine?

Compatibility of alcohol and vaccines

The virus and alcohol are incompatible with each other, so the consequences of such a tandem can be the most unpredictable. This is primarily due to the fact that this combination causes a powerful negative effect on the nervous system and brain.

If a person enters the clinic with suspected rabies while drunk, before administering the drug, the victim is given a drip to cleanse the blood. The procedure is aimed at removing from the body the remains of ethyl alcohol and toxins formed during its breakdown. Only after this can you begin therapy.

After the victim has been vaccinated against rabies, drinking beer, wine or any other alcohol is prohibited throughout the entire vaccination course. It is worth considering that even a minimal amount of alcohol can neutralize the therapeutic effect of the drug, which will cause excessive activity of the virus and the onset of inflammatory processes.

On a note! Drinking alcohol is prohibited even after a preventive vaccination against rabies (which is done before the animal bites), since in this case it is also impossible to predict the body’s reaction to the drug combined with alcohol.

How to abstain from alcohol after vaccination and whether to switch to non-alcoholic wine

Moscow 24 columnist, fitness expert and TV presenter Eduard Kanevsky told how to abstain from alcohol for a long time after vaccination and whether there is any harm from non-alcoholic wine and champagne.

Photo: depositphotos/ufabizphoto

We live in strange, I would even say, troubled times. The year, which began like the previous ones, in its usual rhythm turned into a nightmare for all humanity. Borders are closed, millions of people had to change their habits and even professions in order to maintain the opportunity to work and earn money.

And now there is light at the end of the tunnel: the COVID-19 vaccine has been tested and successfully launched. But those who are planning to get vaccinated soon will not be allowed to drink alcohol even on New Year’s Day. Moreover, according to various sources, you will have to abstain from forty days to two months. The reason to be sad is indeed justified, because for many, alcohol is an obligatory component of this holiday.

According to tradition, at a minimum, you need to make a wish during the chimes and drink champagne under the New Year's fireworks. And now it turns out that those who have been vaccinated are deprived of this last joy?

Probably, no matter how cynical it may sound, but as a promoter of a healthy lifestyle, the news did not upset me, but rather pleased me. Firstly, because I have always been against drinking alcohol, including on holidays. Secondly, the opportunity to vaccinate the population against the virus as soon as possible and return to a full life outweighs the need to give up alcohol on the night of January 1 and the next nine days off.

But my opinion (no matter how logical it may be) is one thing, but people who are used to drinking on New Year’s Eve find it difficult to resist the temptation. Moreover, the whole year already consisted of restrictions and prohibitions.

Photo: depositphotos/EdZbarzhyvetsky

But what to do if you can’t risk your health? Solving this problem, I turned my attention to alcoholic drinks without ethyl alcohol. “Surrogate,” many will say to this. But let's figure out whether non-alcoholic wine really is such and what makes it special. Is it harmless to health due to its composition and can it replace full-fledged alcohol when you really want it?

To begin with, it is important to understand why alcoholic beverages were banned. It's simple: any alcohol contains ethyl alcohol, which in any quantity is a toxin, and the liver must combat its negative effects. The liver is an organ that constantly neutralizes and removes all kinds of bad substances from the body. Vaccination implies a heavy load on the immune system, and therefore on the body as a whole, including the liver, so drinking is not recommended. Those who are taking a course of antibiotics know that drinking alcohol during this period is doubly dangerous to their health. So the recommendation is quite reasonable.

Let's get back to alcohol. If we take wine, for example, we learned how to remove alcohol from it a hundred years ago. Moreover, the process of removing alcohol is very simple: the drink is heated to 70 degrees, and the alcohol evaporates. It is very important that the wine still retains its taste properties, as well as the content of nutrients in it. But yes, you won’t get drunk from such wine.

As for the more New Year's drink, champagne, the creation process here is approximately the same. Moreover, non-alcoholic champagne can be dry, sweet and semi-sweet; you won’t get drunk from it, regardless of the amount of drink you drink. But it is precisely in quantity that those who want to feel at least a little intoxicated will try to get at least some portion of alcohol.

But in any non-alcoholic wine a small percentage of alcohol still remains. And this is where the main danger of drinking such drinks lies: they contain a large amount of carbohydrates. Their excess provokes the development of obesity. The New Year's table is not only drinks, but many traditional dishes based on mayonnaise, eggs, potatoes, and salty foods. In other words, the total calorie content of your diet increases significantly during the holidays. Even without being tied to alcohol, you can easily gain extra pounds, which is really bad for your overall health.

It’s easy to conclude that your health is more important than any holiday; it’s simply not worth risking it for the sake of intoxication. I think one bad year is more than enough to endure a little and then return to the normal life that we miss so much.

Why should you not drink alcohol after receiving a rabies vaccination?

Doctors warn all patients that drinking alcohol is prohibited during the post-vaccination period. This is primarily due to the fact that ethanol can negate the effect of the drug, which is why the therapeutic effect never appears, and the risk of undesirable consequences for the patient (including death) increases several times.

Alcohol is prohibited

In addition, if the patient periodically drinks alcohol during the course of rabies vaccinations, the following side effects may occur:

• soreness in the muscle area;
• nausea and vomiting;
• severe abdominal cramps;
• frequent dizziness;
• headache that does not go away for a long time.

Also, combining a rabies vaccine and alcohol can cause a severe allergic reaction, including angioedema. In some cases, alcohol leads to the fact that the course of the disease becomes hidden, which makes therapy difficult.

What could be the consequences if the patient drank alcohol after a rabies injection?

The validity period of each vaccination during the multi-stage vaccination period is about 10 days. During this time, the immune system must reach its maximum strength sufficient to fight the disease. During this time, the patient may experience headache, vomiting, itching and other side effects, including allergic reactions.

If you take alcohol during this period, allergy symptoms such as angioedema or anaphylactic shock can occur quickly. The patient's condition will deteriorate instantly. Symptoms of rabies damage to the body are accelerated in the presence of alcohol in the blood and severe allergic reactions.

Thus, alcohol itself does not have any effect on the effect of the rabies vaccine. It worked and will continue to work. But you still can’t drink alcohol. This is explained:

• possibility of death from complications,
• acceleration of the development of rabies, which is provoked by alcohol,
• as well as a violation of the vaccination schedule, which may occur as a result of missed vaccination hours by a drunk patient.

All this will not save a person’s life and will lead to death in the shortest possible time.

What happens if the infection occurs while intoxicated?

If a sober person tries to avoid contact with an animal that has symptoms of rabies, then a drunk person does not always objectively assess the situation. Trying to pet or play with a sick cat or dog often results in infection.

It is worth considering that in a person who is intoxicated, the immune and nervous system does not react so quickly to infection, as a result of which the defense becomes less pronounced. As a result, the virus quickly masters and spreads throughout the victim’s body.

Important! If others understand that a person may be infected, he should be taken to the hospital for emergency care as soon as possible. Only in this case is there a chance to avoid disastrous consequences. If help is provided too late, death may occur.

Possible consequences

During immunization, a weakened, but still rabies virus is introduced into the body. Only in this case does the natural development of immunity begin. It is necessary to understand that after a person has been vaccinated against rabies, the body is weakened. To avoid undesirable consequences, you must strictly follow all medical recommendations.

Graft

The vaccine is quite aggressive; if you start drinking alcohol after it, the following side effects may occur:

• fever;
• migraine;
• difficulty breathing;
• bowel dysfunction (most often severe diarrhea develops, which does not go away for several days);
• the appearance of redness and spots on the skin, severe itching;
• excessive sweating;
• severe cough and sore throat;
• increased blood pressure;
• general weakness;
• pain in joints and lymph nodes;
• swelling of the face and limbs;
• exacerbation of chronic diseases.

If you abuse alcohol during the course of rabies vaccinations, you cannot exclude the risk of more serious complications:

• the appearance of epileptic seizures;
• tachycardia, arrhythmia;
• gastrointestinal dysfunction;
• bronchitis, pharyngitis;
• neurological disorders.

Periods of abstinence from alcohol

The attending physician should explain to the patient how much alcohol to drink after vaccination. Despite the fact that the duration of the injection course is only 3 months, you will have to abstain from alcohol for a much longer time. This is due to the fact that after the injections, post-vaccination therapy is carried out, the duration of which is about 5-6 months.

In general, the course of treatment lasts about 9 months and during the entire period patients are strictly prohibited from consuming alcohol. This applies not only to strong alcohol, but even to weak drinks such as beer or champagne. You can drink only after the treatment has been successfully completed. Before doing this, it is definitely recommended to consult a doctor.