An adjuvant is a substance added to produce a high antibody response using the smallest amount of viral-containing (antigen) solution possible in the shot. By definition adjuvants are considered to be "pharmacologically active drugs." They are designed to be inert without inherent activity or toxicity on their own yet they are required to "potently augment effects of the other compounds" in the vaccines.  It is difficult to explain how a substance can be defined as "pharmacologically active" and at the same time, be described as "inert and have no activity or toxicity."

The first adjuvants were used in 1925 by French researcher G. Ramon. He found that by adding breadcrumbs, agar, tapioca, starch, or oil lecithin to vaccines, he could increase the response to diphtheria and tetanus antitoxins. Although these substances are no longer used, adjuvants are regularly added to vaccines and they are grouped chemically into "classes" based on their mechanisms of action. For example, hyper-tensive drugs are grouped together based on how they work; one can be classified as a "beta-blocker" and another as an "ace-inhibitor," based in its effect in the body. Adjuvants are similarly grouped based on the type of immune system response they are thought to induce. But therein lies the rub: After more than 75 years of use, the mechanism of actions for most adjuvants is still "incompletely understood." In other words, what they do to the body is unknown.

For an adjuvant to work it must be attached to a molecule called a "carrier" or a "vehicle." The combination (adjuvant + carrier) is referred to as an "adjuvant formula," a supposedly inert compound. The combination of the attenuated virus or bacteria plus the "adjuvant formula" used in a vaccine causes an amazingly complex immunological cascade of events, including the release of dozens of molecules called cytokines that cause inflammation and activation of the immune response.