You are right, there can be unintended consequences, and they should make long-term trials first to make sure that there is no surprise waiting. On the other hand, it is a very long way from inserting genetic material into a cell and actually change the genetic material of a cell. Just putting an RNA sequence outside the nucleus and hoping it will merge with the DNA does not work.
All this talk about "this is not a vaccine but a gene therapy" is initiated by people who have just understood that RNA has something to do with genes and therefore must be dangerous. And they all miss the point that the antigen presenting cell gets eaten anyway by a killer cell, suicide by cop.
People fearing gene manipulation should keep an eye on the viral vector vaccines instead. They produce the RNA inside the nucleus, dangerously near the DNA. And they do it with adenoviruses, similar to the ones used in the 30 or so commercial available gene therapies.
Agreed on a lot of what you comment here. Just as a touch point, Biontech was specifically calll themselves gene therapy to all investors before the vaccine discussions were going on. So, their own pitches line up with the current worry.
I've seen the video of this Biontech guy. He was talking about using mRNA to produce a stuff inside cells that the cells could not produce by themselves because or a gene defect. He omitted the fact that using mRNA as a delivery mechanism has to be repeated again and again. Because he was talking about a hereditary disease in combination with mRNA medicine, he left the impression that he was talking about a gene therapy (and he did nothing to clarify that, to me it seemed intentionally).
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