Newly released emails obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request show that public health officials knew about “breakthrough cases" of COVID-19 in vaccinated individuals early on, but continued pushing vaccine mandates anyway.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Rochelle Walensky discussed in a January 2021 email how she had spoken to then-NIH Director Francis Collins about the issue.
“Dear all, I had a call with Francis Collins this morning and one of the issues we discussed was that of vaccine breakthroughs. This is clearly and [sic] important area of study and was specifically called out this week here,” she said, adding a link to a paper titled, “SARS-CoV-2 Vaccines and the Growing Threat of Viral Variants.” She goes to say she discussed this with someone “a few weeks ago” and that Dr. Anthony Fauci was also aware.
In media hits months later, however, Walensky was saying that vaccinated individuals “don’t get sick” and “do not carry the virus.”
"Our data from the CDC today suggests that vaccinated people do not carry the virus, don't get sick, and that it's not just in the clinical trials, but it's also in real-world data,” she said on MSNBC in March of 2021.
She then defended those comments in a congressional hearing, arguing it was true when she said it, though it “did change over time.”
In May of 2021, Fauci made similar claims, telling Americans that vaccinated individuals "become a dead end to the virus."
"Even though there are breakthrough infections with vaccinated people, almost always the people are asymptomatic and the level of virus is so low it makes it extremely unlikely — not impossible but very, very low likelihood — that they’re going to transmit it,” Fauci told CBS's "Face the Nation."
“When you get vaccinated, you not only protect your own health and that of the family but also you contribute to the community health by preventing the spread of the virus throughout the community,” he added. “In other words, you become a dead end to the virus. And when there are a lot of dead ends around, the virus is not going to go anywhere. And that’s when you get a point that you have a markedly diminished rate of infection in the community.”
Sharing the email, Stanford School of Medicine professor Jay Bhattacharya called the revelation "stunning."
Stunning FOIA revelation! Three quick items:
— Jay Bhattacharya (@DrJBhattacharya) June 20, 2023
1. @CDCgov director Walensky knew about vax "breakthrough" infections in January 2021. So did Tony Fauci.
2. They continued to push vax mandates anyway.
3. CDC is abusing its FOIA redaction privilege. This is not a classified email. https://t.co/PhFFCKhRh0