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FACT BRIEF

Does a published article confirm the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine causes neurodegenerative diseases?

By Dean Miller
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NO

An anti-vaccine activist's essay is not a report on a clinical or lab study with reproducible experimental methods.

Also, the maker of the vaccine says prion disease -- a neurodegenerative disease -- has never been shown in a lab or clinical study to be a risk of Pfizer's vaccine.

The article's author operates a website that appears to discourage vaccination and he has elsewhere proposed certain vaccines cause diabetes.

A spokesperson for Pfizer told Lead Stories, "There is no evidence to suggest the COVID-19 vaccine causes prion disease." She cited the clinical trials conducted on tens of thousands of participants in studies the FDA relied on in granting approval to Pfizer's vaccine. Documentation of the research and trials is in a 92-page briefing document Pfizer scientists submitted to the FDA in December 2020.

See a full discussion of this at Lead Stories
This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.
Sources
Food and Drug Administration Advisory Committee Briefing Document on Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine
ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTOR
Lead Stories
Lead Stories is a fact checking and debunking website at the intersection of big data and journalism that launched in 2015. It scouts for trending stories, images, videos and posts that contain false information in order to fact check them as quickly as possible. It actively monitors the fake-news ecosystem and doesn’t wait for reader tips or reports before getting started on a story.
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About fact briefs published on Gigafact
Fact briefs are short, credibly sourced summaries that offer “yes/no” answers in response to claims found online. They rely on publicly available, often primary source data and documents. Fact briefs are created by contributors to Gigafact —a nonprofit project looking to expand participation in fact-checking and protect the democratic process. See all fact briefs here.