Concerning Reports of Shingles After COVID-19 Vaccination Found in V-Safe Free-Text Entries

In April, CDC released the third batch of V-safe free-text entries. As readers may remember, it took an order from a federal judge for the American public to get access to these entries from CDC’s COVID-19 vaccine safety monitoring system. 

Nearly 2500 text entries have mentioned shingles (herpes zoster) in the data received so far. Multiple studies have linked shingles outbreaks to mRNA vaccines, including this 2023 meta-analysis and this 2024 literature review. While the mechanism isn’t clear, it is theorized that the vaccines may cause a temporary inability to suppress a latent zoster viral infection, allowing for its reactivation. But in spite of this data, U.S. health authorities have adamantly refused to recognize any causal relationship between the COVID-19 vaccines and this extremely painful condition.

Below are some examples of V-safe entries that mention shingles:

  • “45 minutes after receiving the vaccine I had a flareup of shingles on my leg”
  • “I had an outbreak of shingles. I havent [sic] had it for around 20 years until now.”
  • “Shingles flare up on face and scalp. Symptoms started approximately two hours after my shot, and the rash appeared yesterday. I also had shingles approximately one month before the covid vaccine, in a different location.”
  • “Jan 18 or 19 had pain in back and front on left side along waist and some rash on back still bothering me on 25th so went to Primary care and was diagnosed with shingles. Prescribed Famciclovir for 14 days.”
  • “I have shingles now. Im [sic] not sure if its [sic] a result from the vaccine or something else. I have extreme pain, stabbing, and burning pain.”

As we reported last time, a full accounting of the data won’t be possible until we have all 7.8 million entries. Rest assured that ICAN will do a full analysis at that time to determine just how many safety signals CDC blatantly ignored. In the meantime, we continue to encourage those interested to download the data and review it yourselves.

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