The agency was forced by a federal judge to disclose the reports.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has released previously hidden reports of facial paralysis and other adverse events following COVID-19 vaccination.
The 780,000 reports were received shortly after the COVID-19 vaccines were rolled out and show that people experienced a wide range of post-vaccination problems, including heart inflammation, miscarriages, and seizures.
“Loss of consciousness and seizure immediately following injection. Went to ER by ambulance,” one person reported.
Another stated, “Diagnosed with Bells Palsy today due to left-sided facial numbness and paralysis.”
People lodged the reports with V-safe, a text-message system created by the CDC to monitor for possible side effects of COVID-19 vaccines.
The CDC, for years, declined to make the V-safe data public, instead publishing studies that described the reports as providing reassurance about the safety of the vaccines. However, according to data released in 2022, nearly 8 percent of the 10 million users required medical attention or hospital care after vaccination, and many others reported missing school, work, or other normal activities.
That topline data came from check-the-box surveys.
The same judge who ordered the release of that data ordered the agency in January to disclose free-text entries from a different section in which individuals could describe their experiences. U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, appointed by former President Donald Trump, dismissed the government’s arguments that processing the responses and redacting sensitive information would require too much work.
The first two tranches, made up of 780,000 reports from some 523,000 people, include dozens of reports of heart inflammation, hundreds of reports of facial paralysis, and thousands of reports of tinnitus.
Multiple people said things were so bad that they were struggling with suicidal thoughts.
“For 24 hrs after [the] shot I was so fatigued I could not stay awake. I also have some very strong suicidal thoughts. Zero appetite,” one individual wrote.
Another person said they experienced symptoms of an allergic reaction.
“I read where [sic] this vaccine should not be administered to anyone allergic to PEG and I am allergic to PEG. It would be incredibly reassuring if someone would call me as all I run into is dead ends,” the individual said.
The free-text portion of the surveys was the only place for people to report adverse events, including heart inflammation, even though the CDC knew the vaccines might cause those events, previously released documents show. Other documents show that the CDC became aware of the vaccines possibly causing myocarditis, or heart inflammation, and a related condition called pericarditis early in 2021 but hid the knowledge from the public.
Judge Kacsmaryk’s order came in litigation brought by the Informed Consent Action Network (ICAN), a nonprofit that has compelled the release of a number of government files since the COVID-19 pandemic started.
“ICAN had to sue the Centers for Disease Control in order to gain access to the COVID-19 shot V-safe adverse event data, which is yet another shameful chapter in the decades-long history of federal health officials trying to cover up vaccine risks by ignoring patterns of vaccine reaction symptoms in reports made to the government,” Barbara Loe Fisher, co-founder and president of the National Vaccine Information Center, told The Epoch Times after reviewing the new data.
“When people report the same symptoms over and over again after getting a biological product—in this case ’shortness of breath‘ and ’heart palpitations,’ which are both symptoms of myocarditis that has [sic] been causally linked to mRNA COVID shots—the public should be warned, not kept in the dark. It raises questions about what else government health officials are hiding.”
The free-text entries are not dated. Elizabeth Brehm, an attorney representing ICAN, said the group is seeking the dates of the reports from the CDC. The group does know that the entries are the earliest ones received by the CDC. V-safe was launched as the vaccines were rolled out in late 2020. The rest of the entries are expected to be produced on a rolling basis.
A CDC spokesperson declined to answer many questions, including those related to the dates of entries.
“V-safe participants who reported that they received medical care after vaccination were called and encouraged to submit a VAERS report. If they submitted a VAERS report and the adverse events were classified as serious (as defined in the Code of Federal Regulations), CDC attempted to obtain additional information (medical records, hospital records, etc.) about the reported adverse event,” the spokesperson told The Epoch Times. “All data collected from VAERS is processed and analyzed for unusual patterns or unusually high numbers of rare and serious adverse events after vaccination.”
She said the information from VAERS helped detect problems that the agency now acknowledges are caused by the vaccines, including myocarditis.
Zachary Stieber is a senior reporter for The Epoch Times based in Maryland. He covers U.S. and world news. Contact Zachary at zack.stieber@epochtimes.com