COVID Vaccines Cause More Harm Than Good

What we know

Peter McCullough is an American cardiologist who, since 2021, has become one of the most visible medical critics of COVID-19 vaccines. In appearances that include a gathering of a small group of European Parliament members inaccurately described as an official parliamentary hearing, McCullough has claimed that mRNA vaccines cause a wave of injuries, that the spike protein produced by the vaccine becomes permanently lodged in the heart, and that 73.9% of people who died after vaccination died because of the vaccine itself.

Science Feedback, a network of scientists that reviews public health claims, examined the three studies McCullough cited as evidence for vaccine-induced sudden cardiac death. None supported his claim. One autopsy study of vaccinated individuals explicitly stated that no deaths in the sample were caused by the vaccine. A second study was conducted on people without cardiac symptoms and recorded zero deaths. A third used doses many times higher than those given in actual vaccines, making it inapplicable to real-world clinical practice. AFP Fact Check documented the same pattern in McCullough's presentation to the European Parliament gathering: selective citation of studies paired with conclusions the studies themselves do not support.

Broader population data is unambiguous. Countries that ran large-scale vaccination campaigns saw substantial reductions in COVID-19 hospitalization, intensive care admission, and mortality, particularly among older adults and people with underlying health conditions, a pattern confirmed by health agencies including the CDC, WHO, and the UK Health Security Agency using national surveillance data. The genuine serious side effects that have been identified, chiefly rare cases of myocarditis in young men following mRNA vaccination, are documented transparently in clinical guidance from the CDC and EMA. That same guidance also notes that the risk of myocarditis from COVID-19 infection itself is several times higher than the risk from vaccination, a comparison McCullough's public claims omit.

McCullough's medical board certifications came under formal review following his public statements. As one illustration of the scale of the misinformation involved, in testimony before a U.S. Senate committee McCullough asserted that 20,000 vaccine-related deaths had been reported to the CDC's Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) as confirmed causal deaths, when VAERS explicitly states that reports are unverified and do not establish causation, a distinction the CDC and independent epidemiologists have repeatedly clarified. Raw VAERS reports can be filed by anyone, including for events unrelated to vaccination, which is precisely why the system requires follow-up investigation before any causal claim can be made.

Fact-checking organizations including AFP and Science Feedback have each concluded, independently and using the primary sources McCullough himself cited, that his central claims about COVID-19 vaccines causing net harm are not supported by the evidence. This does not mean mRNA vaccines carry zero risk. Regulators in the United States, Europe, and elsewhere have acknowledged and continue to monitor rare adverse events, but the documented rate of serious harm remains far lower than the documented reduction in death and hospitalization achieved through vaccination during the pandemic. McCullough's authority as a practicing cardiologist gives his claims a veneer of credibility that purely lay commentators lack, which is part of why fact-checkers have devoted sustained attention to correcting his specific citations rather than dismissing his claims outright.

Common claims

• COVID vakcine uzrokuju više štete nego koristi.False
• Spike protein ostaje trajno u srcu nakon vakcinacije.False - mRNA se razgrađuje, spike protein nestaje u tjednima
• McCullough pogrešno prikazuje studije koje navodi kao dokaz.Supported - Science Feedback i AFP to dokumentirali
• COVID vakcine statistički su smanjile hospitalizacije i smrtnost.Supported - populacijski podaci iz desetaka država

Evidence hierarchy

All sources

• Published studies misrepresented by McCullough to push false claim about sudden cardiac deathScience Feedback · 2023
• US cardiologist makes sweeping false claims about effects of Covid-19 vaccinationsAFP Fact Check / RTL · 2025
• Claim that Covid vaccine spike proteins cause heart damage is falseABP Live Fact Check · 2023
• COVID-19 vaccines safety surveillanceWorld Health Organization · 2024
• Selected Adverse Events Reported after COVID-19 VaccinationCenters for Disease Control and Prevention · 2024

Related terms