Children’s Health Defense (CHD) today filed a lawsuit in D.C. Federal Court against the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to obtain documents related to the agency’s safety monitoring of the COVID-19 vaccines through the Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System (VAERS) database.

The lawsuit alleges the FDA violated provisions of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) by refusing to provide key analysis of reports in the vaccine safety database.

CHD submitted the FOIA request in July 2022.

The FDA claimed the records sought are fully exempt from disclosure under FOIA because they are part of internal and intra-agency memoranda that include opinions and discussions protected by law, and because the records include discussions of legal and policy matters protected by attorney-client privilege.

Mary Holland, CHD president and general counsel, took issue with the FDA’s position.

“The public must have truthful, complete information about the risks and benefits of these drugs, and others,” Holland told The Defender.

FDA analyzes VAERS data but doesn’t make its results public

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**Comment**

We pay for this agency yet we don’t get to see what we pay for.