Pfizer CEO's Vaccine Message Sparks Attacks From Vaccine Skeptics

A message from Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla has brought attacks from vaccine skeptics on social media, with his post receiving more than 3 million views.

Bourla's November 9 post on X (formerly Twitter) celebrated the three-year anniversary of Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine passing safety trials. "Three years ago today, we were able to share with the world the joyous news that our #COVID19 vaccine was highly effective in preventing disease," Bourla wrote.

"It was one of the best moments of my career. We could not have reached this point without the extraordinary efforts of our talented and dedicated @Pfizer colleagues and @BioNTech_Group partners," the CEO said.

As of this past April, approximately 366,905,365 Pfizer vaccines had been administered in the U.S., according to Statista. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC) describes the two mRNA vaccines—Pfizer and Moderna—as "safe and effective." The mRNA technology used to create the vaccines had been in development for more than 15 years before the outbreak of the coronavirus epidemic, and both the Pfizer and Moderna versions received full Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval.

Bourla's post included a photo of himself with a group of colleagues, each wearing a "science will win" face mask. "This photo was taken moments after we received the good news from our R&D team, and you can see the smiles through our masks," he wrote.

"As Aristotle said, 'Our problem is not that we aim too high, and we miss. Our problem is that we aim too low and hit.' We reached one moonshot with our #COVID19 vaccine, and now we want to reach more—because our patients are counting on us," Bourla said.

His post has angered vaccine skeptics such as American swimmer and anti-vaxxer Riley Gaines. "The irony of masks that say 'science will win' hahahahaha," she wrote, quoting Bourla's post. "So proud of the effective vaccine that he turned the comments off."

Another poster, @FiveTimesAugust, wrote: "If science won Albert Bourla wouldn't have to turn off his comments every time he posts."

Ryan Gerritson wrote: "Because of individuals like this, the 'science' has lost all credibility."

Others said the Pfizer vaccine was unsafe, with Stacy Phillips writing: "Bourla has committed crimes against humanity with his genocide jab."

Dr Jane Ruby wrote: "You and your fellow filthy animals should be eviscerated. Babies and children have died at your hands."

Newsweek has reached out to Bourla and Pfizer for comment via email.

Is the Pfizer Vaccine Safe?

During the pandemic, the vaccines underwent strict safety monitoring, and the CDC continually reviews the safety of updated versions of the vaccines.

In 2020, social media posts claiming that the Pfizer vaccine caused some negative health effects and deaths began circling. These posts asserted that the vaccine led to six deaths during the clinical trial phase.

Six people died during the Pfizer trials, according to a Reuters fact check. However, there were 44,000 participants in the trials, and no link was found between the deaths and the vaccine.

"None of these deaths were assessed by the investigator as related to study intervention," the FDA said in a statement. "All deaths represent events that occur in the general population of the age groups where they occurred, at a similar rate."

FactCheck.org, a nonprofit website that identifies misinformation in American politics, debunked the claims that COVID-19 vaccines have caused excessive deaths, as alleged by an anti-vaccine group, the Vaccine Damage Project.

Although there were "excess deaths"—a higher than expected number of mortalities across the population during a specific time period—in the U.S. in 2021 and 2022, these were linked to cases of COVID-19, along with increased deaths by drug overdose, alcohol and motor vehicle accidents. Many of the 1.3 million excess deaths from February 2021 to April 2023 were due to COVID-19, according to the CDC.

In May 2022, GOP Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene tweeted a screenshot from an FDA document that discussed adverse reactions to the Pfizer vaccine. She misinterpreted the page, suggesting that 1,223 people died after receiving the Pfizer vaccine.

Although the reports confirm that 1,223 people died after vaccination, the cause of the death was not verified as being linked to the vaccine and was due to a number of reasons, with no "novel safety concerns or risks requiring label changes" found, according to the document.

On November 3, the FDA defended Pfizer against accusations that the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine was "contaminated."

A representative told Newsweek: "With over a billion doses of the mRNA vaccines administered, no safety concerns related to the sequence of, or amount of, residual DNA have been identified."