Man Suffers 'Peeled Off' Skin In Rare COVID-19 Vaccine Side Effect

A 74- year-old man in Virginia suffered a severe adverse reaction to a COVID-19 vaccine four days after being inoculated, and it led to his skin peeling off.

Richard Terrell was given the one-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine in Ashland, Virginia, on March 6, and displayed no odd bodily reactions upon receiving his jab. About four days later, however, strange symptoms began to develop, local news outlet WRIC reported.

After a painful rash enveloped his whole body and turned his skin red, Terell was rushed to the Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) Medical Center, where he spent five days.

“It all just happened so fast. My skin peeled off,” Terrell told the outlet. “It’s still coming off on my hands now.”

“I began to feel a little discomfort in my armpit and then a few days later I began to get an itchy rash, and then after that, I began to swell and my skin turned red,” he recalled of how it started.

Terrell decided it was time for him to push himself to the emergency room when his whole body began to sting and when moving was starting to become difficult for him due to the pain the peeling brought.

“It was stinging, burning, and itching. Whenever I bent my arms or legs, like the inside of my knee, it was very painful where the skin was swollen and was rubbing against itself,” he shared.

After being observed at the VCU Medical Center, doctors confirmed that the sudden onset of rash and skin peeling were adverse reactions to the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine and that his symptoms were a direct result of the shot.

“We ruled out all the viral infections, we ruled out COVID-19 itself, we made sure that his kidneys and liver was okay, and finally we came to the conclusion that it was the vaccine that he had received that was the cause,” Dr. Fnu Nutan, a dermatology hospitalist at VCU Health and one of Terrell’s doctors, told the outlet.

As for why he experienced the rare reaction, the doctors believe Terrell’s genetic make-up and the vaccine type could be the reason. Pfizer's and Moderna's are mRNA vaccines, while Johnson & Johnson's jab is a vector viral.

Nutan went on to explain that Terrell's condition could have been fatal had it been left untreated, saying, “Skin is the largest organ in the body, and when it gets inflamed like he was, you can lose a lot of fluids and electrolytes.”

Despite the incident, the doctor emphasized that Terrell's case is an extremely rare one and that she still encourages everyone to get a COVID-19 vaccine if one is able to, stating that she has seen worse symptoms.

“If you look at the risk for an adverse reaction for the vaccine it’s really, really low,” she said. “We haven’t seen a great concern at all. I am a big proponent of the vaccine.”

Terrell is currently recovering in his home in Goochland, Virginia. Like Nutan, he encourages everyone to get vaccinated.