Earlier this week Ivy League scientists revealed key signs of an alarming new condition they believe is linked to mRNA Covid vaccines.
The previously-unknown condition, dubbed post-vaccination syndrome (PVS), can persist years after receiving the shots—made by the likes of Pfizer and Moderna.
According to the researchers, key signs include persistent brain fog, exercise intolerance, insomnia and palpitations—a fluttering or pounding heart.
Numbness, tinnitus or humming in the ears, headaches, dizziness and feeling ‘a burning sensation,’ are other common signs reported by patients.
Some sufferers also show distinct changes in their immune cells and can even have a dormant virus, which causes flu-like symptoms, reactivate, the team from Yale University said.
Many of these symptoms were commonly reported before the pandemic, so there is currently no way to prove if they are actually caused by the vaccine or are unrelated.
The experts, who unveiled the findings of their small study last week, also emphasized the research is ‘still a work in progress’.
However, they said they will keep studying the condition in an effort to bring affected patients ‘better transparency and safer vaccines.’
The previously-unknown condition, dubbed ‘post-vaccination syndrome’ (PVS), can persist years after taking the mRNA vaccines— made by the likes of Pfizer and Moderna
Dr Akiko Iwasaki, the lead researcher behind the paper, told DailyMail.com she understands the pre-print, which was not peer-reviewed but published on website MedRxiv, could be seen as controversial
Brain fog is a term used to describe a range of cognitive problems that impact on daily life, such as memory difficulties, problems finding the right words and feeling overwhelmed by simple everyday tasks.
Tinnitus, meanwhile, is a hearing problem that most commonly takes the form of persistent ringing in the ears, but can also sound like buzzing, roaring, hissing, or clicking.
When such sounds last more than six months, it’s known as chronic tinnitus.
Insomnia is a sleep disorder that sees sufferers have trouble falling asleep, staying asleep, or getting good quality sleep.
The CDC and NHS recommend adults get between seven and nine hours of sleep on average, and people who don’t get this amount regularly could have insomnia.
Persistent sleep deprivation can take a toll on people’s health from irritability and reduced focus in the short term, to an increased risk of obesity, heart disease and diabetes in the long term.
The Yale scientists also found PVS patients could see a dormant virus in their body called Epstein-Barr reawaken.
More than nine in 10 adults have had Epstein-Barr at some point in their lives, with it being a common infection spread through bodily fluids like saliva or semen.
A 2022 study led by academics at Imperial College London suggests almost 20million lives were saved by Covid vaccines in the first year since countries began rolling out the jabs, the majority in wealthy nations
It causes symptoms like fatigue, fever, and rashes, and once symptoms disappear, the virus remains dormant in the body, where it can be reactivated when the immune system is low.
In the study, the Yale team collected blood samples of 42 Americans with PVS and 22 without it, between December 2022 and November 2023.
People with the syndrome were generally in poorer health than the average American, the researchers found.
Most complaining of the symptoms developed them after their first or second Covid vaccine, with some experiencing an onset after a third or fourth.
People with PVS also had elevated levels of Covid spike proteins.
The levels in PVS patients were even greater than those found in patients with long Covid, a condition with similar symptoms linked to the virus itself.
Persistent spike proteins in the body are thought to cause some of long Covid’s symptoms, by keeping the body in a constant state of inflammation.
Dr Akiko Iwasaki, the lead researcher behind the paper, told DailyMail.com she understands the pre-print, which was not peer-reviewed but published on website MedRxiv, could be seen as controversial.
People with PVS also had elevated levels of Covid spike proteins. The levels in PVS patients were even greater than those found in patients with long Covid , a condition with similar symptoms linked to the virus itself
But, she added: ‘We would like to expand our research to a larger cohort and validate our current findings. We need funding to carry out such future work.’
Independent experts, however, have urged for caution over the findings.
Dr John Wherry, director of the Institute for Immunology at the University of Pennsylvania, said it’s possible some of the excess spike protein identified in the study may be from undetected Covid infections.
He told The New York Times: ‘I would like to see more data on this topic.’
Writing on X, Dr Adam Gaffney, an assistant professor of pulmonary and critical care medicine at Harvard University, also said: ‘There’s nothing wrong with studying vaccine side effects. There is a problem with this study.
‘We’re at a moment right now where the US government is undercutting people’s trust in science and vaccinations probably like never before in history.
‘And to coin this novel syndrome without even proving that it’s caused by the vaccine is very worrisome to me.’
The mRNA Covid vaccines are estimated to have saved tens of millions of lives globally from Covid, 1.6million in Europe and 3million in the US.
They are also credited with helping end the series of paralyzing lockdowns brought on by the Covid pandemic.
The CDC still recommends Covid vaccines, especially for those who are elderly or immunocompromised and vulnerable to the disease.
Covid is also still killing about 300 Americans every week, CDC data shows.
Covid vaccines are not currently available in the UK via the NHS, though they are expected to roll out again in the spring.
This isn’t the first mRNA jabs have been linked to worrying side effects.
Global reports of myocarditis, a potentially dangerous inflammation of the heart muscle, have also spooked health officials in the US and UK.
In myocarditis, it’s thought that the immune system may register mRNA in Covid vaccines as a threat, leading the immune system to attack itself and cause inflammation of the myocardium, the heart’s muscle.
This same mechanism has been linked to pericarditis, which leads to inflammation of the pericardium, the sac surrounding the heart.
Both conditions have been linked to viruses like the common cold and hepatitis, as well as Covid.
While most cases are mild, in rare instances, myocarditis can damage the heart and make it difficult for it to pump blood, eventually leading to heart failure, heart attack, and stroke.
Scientists have found rates of myocarditis in Britain were eventually found to be lower than in the US and Israel.
Some experts attributed this to the UK’s longer intervals between doses, eight weeks compared to four, which is said to give the body more time to recover.
In the US, the side effect is rare but exactly how rare is still being debated. Estimates range from one in 50,000 to one in 200,000.
Data also showed that the risk of myocarditis from Covid itself was far higher than that from a vaccine, so experts continued to recommend the vaccines.
There are no figures for the number of PVS patients in Britain.
Dr Trevor Keyler, a biology professor in Minnesota, was an avid mountain biker when he developed cataracts and tremors after his Moderna vaccine. He is pictured with his two children
Lindy Ayers, 31, was a military veteran, triathlete, and skateboarding competitor before she was left wheelchair bound after her Covid shot. She is pictured at left before the injury and at right after
However, government data has recorded the number of people applying for compensation for injuries and deaths they believe to be caused by the vaccines.
The latest figures, published by Parliament last month, show a total of 17,379 applications had been made to the UK’s Vaccine Damage Payment Scheme as of November last year, with at least 70 of these related to deaths.
However, just 194 have been deemed eligible for payment.
The controversial scheme predates the Covid shots and offers some victims of vaccine injuries and deaths a one-off payment of £120,000 (about $150,000).
Of the 9,196 rejected claims, 416 were done so on the grounds that, while a victim had been injured by a vaccine, they didn’t meet the 60 percent disability threshold.
However, a further 7,173 victims, or their families, are still awaiting a verdict, meaning the totals could still rise.
Meanwhile, data from the US Covid vaccine injury compensation program suggested that 14,000 people had filed claims for injury or death they claimed were caused by the vaccine as of December 2024, out of the 270million Americans who received at least one dose.
But only one in four claims have been reviewed, according to the Health Resources & Services Administration, an agency within the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).
Of those reviewed, 58 are ‘eligible for compensation.’ In order to be eligible, a person must be able to prove their injury was directly caused by a vaccine.
