Ron Johnson presses FDA for COVID-19 vaccine safety data

"FDA’s intentional withholding of information relating to the safety of the COVID-19 vaccines is outrageous and shows a complete disregard for the health and safety of the American people," he said.

By Ben Whedon

Published: September 8, 2023 3:54pm

Wisconsin GOP Sen. Ron Johnson this week admonished U.S. Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Robert Calif, suggesting his agency was actively hiding pertinent safety information related to COVID-19 vaccines.

"On June 15, 2023, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) refused to provide my office with data relating to the safety of the COVID-19 vaccines," he wrote in a Sept. 5 letter first obtained by the Epoch Times. "FDA’s intentional withholding of information relating to the safety of the COVID-19 vaccines is outrageous and shows a complete disregard for the health and safety of the American people."

"The notion that FDA is actively hiding information about vaccine safety signals from Congress and the American people is beyond despicable, particularly given the fact that COVID19 vaccine adverse events can and do occur," he added. "With FDA's Vaccine and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee voting to recommend updates and continued use of the mRNA COVID-19 vaccines, the public has a right to know the extent to which their health may be negatively affected by this vaccine technology."

Johnson set a deadline of Sept. 19 for the FDA to provide Congress with the relevant data.

In writing to Calif, he noted that he had cc'd the commissioner on multiple prior requests to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for vaccine safety data.

"Since June 2022, I have copied you on multiple requests to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) regarding its surveillance of COVID-19 vaccine adverse events," Johnson added. "These requests were based off of a January 29, 2021 Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) document describing how 'CDC and FDA will perform routine VAERS [Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System] surveillance to identify potential new safety concerns for COVID-19 vaccines.'"

"CDC failed to fully comply with my requests for the data it supposedly compiled in order to track vaccine adverse events," he continued. Johnson, since 2022, has issued at least four requests to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for that information.

Ben Whedon is an editor and reporter for Just the News. Follow him on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter.