Vaccine death reports are not what they seem

The US government maintains a database called VAERS, for which anyone can file a report if they think something bad has happened to them after receiving a vaccine. It is an important tool for keeping an eye on vaccine safety, but it is also being used by anti-vaccine campaigners to make vaccines scarier than they are.

VAERS is the abbreviation for Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System. “Adverse events” are literally things that happen (events) that are bad (unwanted). Scientists and doctors tend to prefer this term to something like “side effects”, implying a cause and effect relationship that often cannot be established. If you have a headache after receiving an injection, for example, this is an adverse event. Was it caused by the vaccine? Maybe, but that’s a separate question, and it can be difficult to answer definitely.

How VAERS is actually used

As the CDC explains here, the VAERS database was established in 1990 as part of a package of vaccine safety reforms. (The same law established a no-fault vaccine court to compensate people for injuries caused by vaccines without having to sue drug companies.)

Everybody can submit a report to VAERS: you, your doctor, a member of your family, even your lawyer. (Doctors are required to report certain adverse events, but for the most part, submissions are voluntary.) It’s a bit like Wikipedia, in a way: TThe things in it may not all be true, but probably a lot are, and you can still learn a lot from what is in it.

The idea is that if there is is a problem with a vaccine, reports will begin to appear in VAERS. Investigators will look at events that appear to be serious, common, or related. Here is how HHS describes the objectives of the program:

• Detect new, unusual or rare vaccine adverse events;
• Monitor the increase in known adverse events;
• Identify potential risk factors for patients for particular types of adverse events;
• Assess the safety of newly licensed vaccines;
• Determine and process the possible report clusters (p. e.g., suspected localized [temporally or geographically] or notification of product / lot / lot specific adverse events);
• Recognize persistent safe use issues and administration errors;
• Provide a national safety surveillance system that spans the entire general population to respond to public health emergencies, such as a large-scale pandemic influenza vaccination program.

Reports in VAERS can be an early warning if there are problems associated with a vaccine, or even a particular batch of vaccine. It is one of the many ways regulators have said they will keep an eye on safety as new COVID vaccines are rolled out.

How VAERS is misused

Anti-vaccine campaigners have misused and distorted VAERS for as long as it has existed. Reports are publicly available, so anyone can search the database, and they do.

Before searching the database, you need to click on a huge disclaimer screen explaining that reports are unverified and listing others limits. (Vice recently reported an activist group has created a research portal for VAERS that allows you to view reports without seeing this screen.)

Yesor can Probably see the problem here. Pulling out a bunch of reports that say “dead” and mention a certain vaccine doesn’t mean the vaccine killed those people. It just means that the person died some time after receiving the vaccine. In fact, a recent analysis of adverse events from the COVID vaccine, both from VAERS reports and another surveillance system called V-SAFE, found that most deaths after vaccination were in older people residing in long-term care facilities and were not likely to be caused by vaccines.

So if you see any information being shared that claims to attribute deaths, miscarriages, or other frightening reactions to the new COVID vaccines, apply your common sense of critical thinking and find out where the data comes from. There could most likely be safety concerns with these or any other vaccines., but if there is, any serious issue would be in the headlines – so beware if you only hear about it in a viral Facebook post.