Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has hired Lt. Col. Theresa Long, an Army doctor with no vaccine or virology training, to investigate unverified claims that COVID vaccines killed more than 2,500 U.S. service members, as The New York Times’ Apoorva Mandavilli and Jan Hoffman report. Long, who reports to both Kennedy and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, is combing 55,000 VAERS reports, the government’s largest but least reliable vaccine-safety database.
Little evidence, big claims
More than 96 percent of troops were vaccinated before the mandate was dropped, and a 2026 Pentagon report found no vaccine-linked deaths. Long testified she personally knew of 28 such deaths and claimed the shots caused pregnancy loss at an 82 percent rate, which large studies contradict. She also likened a Pentagon official who advised vaccinating troops to Nazi doctors hanged at Nuremberg.
“I have not seen any convincing reports that large numbers of people have died due to the vaccine,” said Dr. Ofer Levy of Boston Children’s Hospital, who still favors targeted safety research in young troops.
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