The Conspiracy Theorists Were Right—Again: FDA Data Mining Flaw Hid Major COVID Vaccine Safety Signals

A new Senate report drops a bombshell on how the FDA’s own analytical methods allegedly buried dozens of serious safety signals for Pfizer and Moderna COVID vaccines in early 2021. While public messaging hammered “safe and effective” with near-absolute confidence, internal data told a more complicated story that regulators downplayed or obscured.

Senator Ron Johnson’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations (PSI) Majority Staff Interim Report details how Dr. Ana Szarfman, a senior FDA medical officer and data mining expert who helped build the agency’s system, flagged a critical flaw called “masking.” In the standard FDA approach (Empirical Bayesian data mining on VAERS), high-volume reports for one vaccine could statistically drown out or cancel signals for others—especially as massive COVID vaccine rollout flooded the system.

Szarfman, collaborating with the method’s originator, developed an adjusted approach that “unmasked” dozens of statistically significant signals the official method missed. The report accuses senior officials, including Dr. Peter Marks at the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, of being informed but failing to fully adjust or prioritize transparency.

The Unmasked List Of Major Signals

Here’s the comparison of suppressed or missed signals versus what the adjusted analysis revealed (drawn from the report and related analyses):

Neurological & Dysautonomia

• Bell’s palsy (Suppressed Signal)
• Paraesthesia ear (Suppressed Signal)
• Bradykinesia (Suppressed Signal)
• Basal ganglia stroke (Suppressed Signal)
• Cerebral artery occlusion (Suppressed Signal)
• Thalamic infarction
• Sinus rhythm abnormality
• Agonal rhythm
• Diaphragmatic spasm
• Dementia (Pfizer-specific)

Cardiac

• Sudden cardiac death (Suppressed Signal)
• Acute left ventricular failure (Suppressed Signal)
• Diastolic dysfunction (Suppressed Signal)
• Ejection fraction abnormal (Suppressed Signal)
• Hypertensive emergency (Suppressed Signal)
• Blood pressure systolic changes (Suppressed Signal)
• Aortic stenosis (Suppressed Signal)
• Cardiac failure chronic
• Acute myocardial infarction (Pfizer, Moderna)
• Cardiac telemetry abnormal (Pfizer, Suppressed Signal)

Vascular & Pulmonary

• Pulmonary infarction (Suppressed Signal)
• Embolic stroke
• Ischaemic stroke
• Aortic aneurysm rupture
• May-Thurner syndrome
• Hypomagnesaemia (Suppressed Signal)

Other

• Cholecystitis acute (Suppressed Signal)
• AST/ALT ratio abnormal
• Mastoid disorder
• Cardiac assistance device user
• Brain natriuretic peptide increased
• Asymptomatic COVID-19 (Pfizer, Suppressed Signal)

The FDA’s standard method allegedly masked or obscured these statistical safety signals.

What This Actually Means

This isn’t proof that the vaccines caused these events at population scale. VAERS is a passive reporting system—anyone can submit, reports aren’t verified causation, and massive vaccination campaigns (hundreds of millions of doses) naturally generate reports. Background rates, reporting biases, and the pandemic itself complicate interpretation. Many issues like myocarditis/pericarditis (especially in young males) were later acknowledged, studied, and led to label updates and age restrictions.

But the brutal reality: Early on, officials projected bulletproof confidence while their own expert warned of a methodological blind spot hiding potential red flags. Szarfman raised alarms in March 2021 and beyond, yet the response reportedly included concerns about “anti-vax” narratives over aggressive follow-up. Public health messaging often blurred the line between “rare risks” and “zero risks,” eroding trust when injuries surfaced.

Critics, including “conspiracy theorists” dismissed at the time, pointed to exactly this kind of data opacity, under-reporting incentives, and institutional pressure to maintain uptake during the emergency. The report suggests they weren’t entirely wrong about hidden signals.

The Bigger Picture

Vaccines likely saved many lives during the deadliest phases of COVID, particularly for the elderly and vulnerable. But safety surveillance failures, combined with “safe and effective” absolutism, fueled skepticism. Mandates, censorship of dissenting data, and slow acknowledgment of risks (e.g., clotting with certain platforms, cardiac issues) amplified the damage.

Senator Johnson’s report demands accountability: Why wasn’t the superior “demasking” method adopted faster? Why the resistance to Szarfman’s findings? Full causation studies, long-term data, and honest risk-benefit analyses per age/group remain essential—not political theater.

Public trust in institutions took a beating for reasons like this. When regulators prioritize narrative control over ruthless data transparency, people notice. The unmasked signals deserve rigorous, independent scrutiny—not dismissal.