Between December 2020 and May 2021 the VAERS contractor told CDC in writing that it could not keep up. CDC and FDA staff discussed the backlog among themselves, bought capacity, set priorities and asked for backlog numbers. In the same months CDC briefed its public advisory committee, answered Congress and kept a public website that said nothing about it. This record names every person the documents place in that exchange, from the staff who wrote the emails to the President who told the public the vaccines were safe: what each did and said, who each answered to, and who held the authority to tell the public. Every line links to the page it comes from, and every name links to that person's card on the map.
| Level | CDC | FDA | Contractor |
|---|---|---|---|
| President | Joe Biden, from 20 January 2021: head of the executive branch that contains HHS, CDC and FDA. White House communications: Benjamin Wakana, Deputy Director for Strategic Communications and Engagement | ||
| HHS Secretary | Xavier Becerra, from March 2021: head of the department that contains CDC and FDA | ||
| Agency head | Rochelle Walensky, Director (from Jan 2021) | Janet Woodcock, Acting Commissioner | |
| Center | NCEZID (Daniel Jernigan, Director as of 2024) | CBER (Peter Marks, Director) | |
| Division | DHQP; Immunization Safety Office (ISO) | Office of Biostatistics and Epidemiology (OBE) | GDIT, Falls Church VA (see its map card) |
| Program leads | Tom Shimabukuro, ISO Deputy Director and Vaccine Safety Team lead; John Su, VAERS program contact | Craig Zinderman, Associate Director for Medical Policy | Stacey Neloms, project manager |
| Staff | Traci Roberts (COR), Paige Marquez, Elaine Miller, Tanya Myers, Bonita Johnson | Manette Niu, Bethany Baer, Jane Baumblatt, Jane Woo, Meghna Alimchandani, Narayan Nair | Contracts administrators |
| Contracts | OAS under OFR under OCOO: Philip Denis (Contracting Officer), Nathan Amador, Lindsey Crockett | ||
Reporting lines are read from the address codes, the signature blocks and who instructs whom in the emails; no organisation chart is in the documents. Source of the chain: the address codes on every 2021 email (CDC/DDID/NCEZID/DHQP for the program office, CDC/OCOO/OFR/OAS for contracts, FDA/CBER), the signature blocks quoted below, the cover of the CDC VAERS COVID-19 procedures ("VAERS Team, Immunization Safety Office, Division of Healthcare Quality Promotion, National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases"), and the 15 February 2024 witness list (hearing). The ISO director above Shimabukuro in 2021 is not named in the documents read.
| Duty | Held by | What the record shows |
|---|---|---|
| Know how many reports were waiting | Su, Marquez, Miller, Roberts, Shimabukuro; Denis in contracts | The contractor told Su, Marquez, Miller and Roberts on 29 Dec 2020 and Denis and Roberts on 10 Feb 2021; Su asked it to quantify the backlog on 18 Feb 2021, with Shimabukuro copied. |
| Decide the size of the response | Shimabukuro | Chose the 25,000-a-week maximum on 22 Feb 2021; the capacity started the week of 19 April. |
| Brief the public advisory committee | Shimabukuro (presenter), Walensky (gave welcome remarks on 1 Mar) | ACIP, 27 Jan, 1 Mar, 14 Apr, 12 May 2021: no slide states the backlog; the 1 Mar deck footnotes the 104,763 versus about 17,400 difference. |
| Set what the VAERS website tells the public | ISO leadership (Shimabukuro); Miller handled the December 2020 COVID text with CDC counsel | Archived pages of 22 Feb, 16 Mar, 14 Apr and 13 May 2021 say data appear 4-6 weeks after receipt; none mentions volume or delay. |
| Answer Congress | Walensky (CDC), Marks and Woodcock (FDA) | 11 May 2021 (Marks), 4 Nov 2021 (Walensky, Woodcock), 11 Jan 2022 (Walensky): "the most robust vaccine safety system." The first public acknowledgement of the volume in the sources read is Marks under oath on 15 Feb 2024. |
| Tell the public the vaccines were safe | President Biden, Walensky, Marks | 9 Sep 2021, the President: "We've made vaccinations free, safe, and convenient" and "What more do you need to see?" VAERS had taken 103,637 reports in April and 47,172 that September. |
| Authority over all of the above | Walensky for CDC; Marks for FDA's half; above them Becerra and Biden | FDA staff (Baer, Niu) wrote the backlog down on 12 Mar and 12 Apr 2021 inside CBER, Marks's center. CDC and FDA are agencies within HHS. |
The people with the most direct line to the public record were Shimabukuro, who presented to ACIP at least four times in 2021, and Walensky, who led the agency and testified to Congress. The authority to put a notice on the VAERS website, or a number on an ACIP slide, sat in the Immunization Safety Office and above it. FDA's half sat with Marks, whose staff wrote the backlog down in March and April 2021.
Joe Biden · Benjamin Wakana · Xavier Becerra · Tom T. Shimabukuro · John R. Su · Traci Sinetta Roberts · Paige L. Marquez · Elaine R. Miller · Tanya R. Myers · Bonita C. Johnson · Philip Denis · Nathan Amador and Lindsey M. Crockett · Charles Licata · Craig E. Zinderman · Manette T. Niu · Bethany Baer · Jane A. G. Baumblatt · Rochelle P. Walensky · Peter Marks · Janet Woodcock · Daniel B. Jernigan · Henry Walke · Abbigail Tumpey · Renata Engler · Stacey M. Neloms and the contractor's contracts administrators
Post. President of the United States from 20 January 2021; head of the executive branch that contains the Department of Health and Human Services, CDC and FDA
Chain of command. Above the HHS Secretary (Xavier Becerra), the CDC Director (Rochelle Walensky) and FDA's Acting Commissioner (Janet Woodcock).
| 25 May 2021 | His White House's Deputy Director for Strategic Communications and Engagement, Benjamin Wakana, emails Walensky and other health officials a 17-page "tough" Q&A that includes myocarditis; CDC's FOIA release blacked out all 17 pages (Senate PSI report, PDF p. 22). |
| Sep 2021 | VAERS takes 47,172 COVID-19 reports that month, 953 reporting a death and 4,897 a hospitalization; April 2021 had taken 103,637, 1,486 reporting a death and 6,800 a hospitalization (public VAERS data, counted for the article). The contractor had told CDC on 10 Feb 2021 that its backlog stood at "currently over 70,000" (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 204) and cleared it on 30 May 2021 (GDIT report, PDF p. 24). |
| 9 Sep 2021 | Addresses the nation on the COVID-19 response, 18 days after the record 14,593-report VAERS day of 22 August 2021: "What more is there to wait for? What more do you need to see? We've made vaccinations free, safe, and convenient. The vaccine has FDA approval. Over 200 million Americans have gotten at least one shot. We've been patient, but our patience is wearing thin. And your refusal has cost all of us. So, please, do the right thing." (remarks). |
| 9 Sep 2021 | Announces vaccination requirements for 17 million health care workers in facilities that take Medicare and Medicaid, all executive-branch federal employees and federal contractors, and a Labor Department rule for employers with 100 or more employees, over 80 million workers. The word he uses for the vaccines is "safe." |
Post. Deputy Director for Strategic Communications and Engagement, Biden White House (title as given in the Senate PSI report)
Chain of command. White House communications staff, writing to the CDC Director and other health officials.
| 25 May 2021 | Emails CDC Director Walensky, NIH Director Francis Collins and other senior health officials a 17-page "tough" questions-and-answers document on myocarditis risks, vaccine efficacy and the lab-leak question (Senate PSI report, PDF p. 22). CDC's FOIA release blacked out all 17 pages; HHS produced them unredacted to the Senate in 2025. The Senate majority staff report calls the myocarditis talking points misleading; that wording is the report's. |
| 24 May 2021 | The day before, the draft notes of CDC's vaccine safety work group asked "Is VAERS signaling for myopericarditis now?" and answered "For the age groups 16-17 years and 18-24 years, yes" (Senate PSI report, PDF p. 5). Nothing read shows what Wakana knew of that. |
Post. Secretary of Health and Human Services from March 2021; head of the department that contains CDC and FDA
Chain of command. Reports to the President; above the CDC Director and FDA's Acting Commissioner. ICAN's complaint describes CDC as an agency "organized within HHS" (D.D.C. 1:23-cv-00747, ECF 1, para. 4).
| 30 Jul and 9 Sep 2021 | Signs the eighth and ninth amendments to the PREP Act declaration for COVID-19 countermeasures (the project's record of his signed amendments, on his map card); the ninth is dated the day of the President's speech. |
| Mar 2021 to 2025 | Heads the department when the VAERS backlog runs (Dec 2020 to 30 May 2021), when the contractor's surge is bought, and when the CDC Director and FDA's Acting Commissioner testify to the Senate that the safety system is the most robust ever documented. |
Post. Deputy Director, Immunization Safety Office (ISO), CDC (his own March 2021 signature block, FOIA 23-00056, PDF p. 703); lead of the Vaccine Safety Team, CDC COVID-19 Vaccine Task Force (title slide of every 2021 ACIP deck). Captain, U.S. Public Health Service. Director of ISO by April 2025 (Sen. Johnson, letter of 9 Apr 2025).
Chain of command. Reports up through the ISO director to the Division of Healthcare Quality Promotion (DHQP), the National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases (NCEZID) and the CDC Director. Every 2021 email carries the address code CDC/DDID/NCEZID/DHQP. Directs: John Su, Paige Marquez, Elaine Miller, Tanya Myers and the VAERS and v-safe staff; instructs the contracting officer's representative, Traci Roberts.
| 2015 | First author of the CDC and FDA's own methods paper on VAERS, Vaccine 33:4398 (with Nguyen, Martin and DeStefano): on the RotaShield signal: "Given the known underreporting of adverse events to VAERS, these findings were concerning enough for CDC to suspend its recommendation" (copy in the Senate PSI release, Part 3). He wrote the standard for reading VAERS before he ran it. |
| 30 Oct 2020 | Presents "CDC post-authorization/post-licensure safety monitoring of COVID-19 vaccines" (deck, title slide). |
| 10-18 Dec 2020 | On the distribution of the launch-week emails among CDC (Marquez, Su, Roberts, Myers), FDA (Zinderman, Woo, Baumblatt, Alimchandani) and the contractor on how COVID vaccines are entered into VAERS (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 112, FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 300). |
| 27 Jan 2021 | ACIP slide: for a reported death the contractor "expedites processing of the report (processed the day of report)," and CDC and FDA physicians review all death reports "as soon as notified" (ACIP deck). One day earlier CDC's contract staff had written that the processing contract needed more capacity (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 476). |
| 11 Feb 2021 | Repeats the same death-report slide on the NAIIS partner call (deck), the day after the contractor wrote that the backlog stood at "currently over 70,000" (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 204). |
| 18 Feb 2021 | Copied on John Su's email to the contractor relaying FDA's questions: the latest date for which all domestic COVID-19 reports have been processed, and the backlog for non-COVID vaccines "days, weeks, months?" (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 173). |
| 19 Feb 2021 | The contracting officer sends him, Su and Roberts the contractor's final surge proposal (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 195). |
| 22 Feb 2021 | "We are going with the max amount, 25,000 per week. It will be $21 million. Given the urgency and our desire to manage risk, we felt like we had to go as big as possible." (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 194). The decision on the size of the surge is his. |
| 26 Feb-4 Mar 2021 | Copied on every contract-office email executing Modification 00003 (backlog) and 00004 (surge) (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 428 to FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 431). |
| 28 Feb 2021 | On the Sunday Israel's request for a CDC point of contact is logged (Task ID 42633), his forward of it to FDA's Steven Anderson, Richard Forshee and Narayan Nair reads "FYI" (FOIA 23-00056, PDF p. 297, FOIA 23-00056, PDF p. 298). |
| 1 Mar 2021 | Briefs ACIP: 104,763 reports "pre-processed," 94 percent non-serious; the adverse-event table is footnoted as the reports "received and processed (coded, redacted, and quality assurance performed)," which is about 17,400 reports (deck, slides 11-12). CDC Director Walensky gives the welcome remarks (ACIP summary, PDF p. 7). The deck states neither the unprocessed number nor the backlog. The summary records him saying: "if a person reports that they received medical care in any health check-in, there is an attempt to contact that person" (ACIP summary, PDF p. 78). |
| 8-30 Mar 2021 | Sends CDC safety analyses to members of the WHO Global Advisory Committee on Vaccine Safety (GACVS) COVID-19 subcommittee after they ask about myocarditis and thromboembolic events. 29 Mar: "Please keep this information close hold." 30 Mar: "Please treat these as confidential as well." (FOIA 23-00056, PDF p. 703, FOIA 23-00056, PDF p. 700, FOIA 23-00056, PDF p. 699). |
| 6-9 Apr 2021 | On the work-group thread "Signal eval considerations," Lauri Markowitz asks the members, him included: "How do we communicate these RCA results to the public?" (FOIA 23-00056, PDF p. 825). On 9 Apr he is on the "Call re: CVST cases in VAERS" (FOIA 23-00056, PDF p. 975). |
| 12 Apr 2021 | DoD's Dr. Renata Engler tells the work group he leads that V-safe offers users ten pre-programmed symptoms and cannot see cardiac events: "If you do not ask, you will not see it, but does that mean it does not exist?" (Senate PSI report, PDF p. 46). V-safe's protocol of 20 May keeps the symptom list and narrows the follow-up call to medically attended events (PDF p. 47). |
| 14 Apr 2021 | Briefs ACIP on cerebral venous sinus thrombosis after the Janssen vaccine, a deck with no statement on report-processing capacity (deck). |
| 19 Apr 2021 | Asked whether there has been a signal with pericarditis and mRNA vaccines, writes: "DoD and the Israeli MOH think they have a signal for myocarditis with mRNA vaccines, but there is potentially a lot of ascertainment bias in the DoD data. We don't have any evidence to suggest a signal or safety problem for myocarditis or pericarditis with mRNA vaccines from VAERS and VSD surveillance" (Senate PSI report, PDF p. 13). The report adds that other CDC officials acknowledged myocarditis reports may not reach VAERS if providers never enter them. |
| 21 Apr 2021 | Copied for awareness on CDC's answer to Idaho's epidemiology field officer, who had asked whether VAERS had received two myocarditis reports after second Pfizer doses and whether CDC saw a signal: "I did not find either of these reports in VAERS yet, but due to processing delays, VAERS may have received them but not processed them yet. To date, CDC vaccine safety monitoring systems have not found evidence of a concerning pattern of reports of myocarditis" (FOIA 23-00056, PDF p. 797, FOIA 23-00056, PDF p. 903). The contractor's backlog was then tens of thousands of reports. |
| 26-27 Apr 2021 | His "Please read: Myocarditis" reply is forwarded to CDC Director Walensky by Henry Walke, "See below" (FOIA 23-00056, PDF p. 945). |
| 28 Apr 2021 | To John Su on the myocarditis cases: "We need to expedite these reviews and get ahead of the situation before it starts dictating our actions." (FOIA 23-00056, PDF p. 973). |
| 30 Apr 2021 | Last author of the Janssen safety-monitoring report in MMWR. It lists three limitations (passive surveillance, medical review "in progress," v-safe opt-in). Report-processing capacity is not among them. |
| 12 May 2021 | Briefs ACIP on thrombosis with thrombocytopenia: "FDA physicians screen incoming VAERS reports daily ... (i.e., screening of pre-processed reports)" and closes with "The U.S. vaccine safety monitoring system is able to rapidly detect rare adverse events" (deck, slide 13 and closing slides). The next day CDC orders reports on people 18 and younger processed first (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 91). |
| 22 Mar 2022 | Copied on the extension of the VAERS surge beyond 26 Aug 2022 (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 353). |
| 19 Mar-9 Apr 2025 | HHS tells Sen. Ron Johnson's staff it is "having difficulty locating records belonging to Dr. Tom Shimabukuro." Johnson asks the Attorney General to investigate whether official records were deleted (letter, pp. 1-3). |
Status. At CDC through at least October 2026 (Influenza Division affiliation on 2026 papers). Not a presenter at any 2025 ACIP meeting. No CDC page names a current ISO director; a search result for his CDC biography calls him the former director, and the page now redirects to a blog index. (Personnel file and web check, 25 Oct 2026.)
Post. ISO/DHQP, CDC; the program office's day-to-day VAERS contact with the contractor and FDA; cc on every contractor monthly report (GDIT report, PDF p. 1)
Chain of command. Works under Shimabukuro. Deals with the contractor beside the contracting officer's representative (Roberts).
| 29 Dec 2020 | Receives the contractor's request to revise processing timeframes; replies "Let's wait until Traci's back from leave, then we can set up a meeting ... Stacey and I spoke, and I think we have a workable interim plan" (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 96). The contractor had written that VAERS was "consistently receiving over 1,000 Covid-19 reports per day." |
| 18 Feb 2021 | Asks the contractor to quantify the backlog after FDA asks CDC for "a more quantitative measure" (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 173). |
| 26 Feb 2021 | Writes to the contractor "prepping for Janssen vaccine's use" (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 122). |
| 21 Apr 2021 | Copied with Shimabukuro on Elaine Miller's answer to Idaho that VAERS may not yet have processed myocarditis reports "due to processing delays" (FOIA 23-00056, PDF p. 797). |
| 13 May 2021 | Copied with Shimabukuro on the order to process reports on people 18 and younger within 48 hours (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 91). |
| 18 May 2021 | Asks the contractor for the list of VAERS IDs "received (but still waiting processing)" for 1-16 May (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 128). The contractor sends it with the file name "Pre-process" (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 127). |
| 23 Jun 2021 | Follows up on 80 Guillain-Barre reports after Janssen that the contractor was asked to prioritise (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 329). |
| 22 Mar 2022 | On the surge extension beyond 26 Aug 2022 (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 353). |
| 2023-24 | Coordinates the tinnitus paper with FDA, writing that data-mining "novel methodologies make me uncomfortable if they haven't been vetted" (Senate PSI Part 1, PDF p. 3). |
| 18-19 Sep 2025 | Presents three safety updates to ACIP as "Dr. John Su (CDC/NCEZID)" (ACIP agenda and summary, 18-19 Sep 2025). |
Status. ISO, DHQP, NCEZID on 2026 papers; presenter at ACIP in September 2025.
Post. Public Health Analyst, ISO/DHQP; contracting officer's representative (COR) for the VAERS contract; addressee of every contractor monthly report (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 476, GDIT report, PDF p. 1). One address line tags her "(CTR)" (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 473).
Chain of command. Takes direction from Shimabukuro and Su; instructs the contract office (Denis, Crockett, Amador) and the contractor (Neloms).
| 26 Jan 2021 | "Due to substantially higher than expected response, we need to increase the contractor's capacity to fulfill the requirements of the VAERS Surge contract." She names both contracts, the VAERS surge order (200-2020-F-09621) and the call-center order (200-2021-F-10131) (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 476). |
| 10 Feb 2021 | Copied on the contractor's letter that it "is unable to process all of the incoming reports in a timely manner" and that the backlog of expired reports is "currently over 70,000" (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 204). |
| 12 Feb 2021 | Copied when the contracting officer asks for a modification proposal for the backlog and a six-month surge ("CDC believes that the reports will be in the range of 4,000 - 5,000 a day") (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 199). |
| 22 Feb 2021 | Sends the contractor's surge proposal to Marquez for technical review; receives Shimabukuro's decision (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 194). |
| Feb 2021 | Routes the cost reviews for the surge modification (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 466 to FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 473). |
| 7 Dec 2021 | Forwards the "VAERS Surge Call Discussion Items" to the contractor. The contractor's answers include: "Per CDC request, we are not following up on COVID non-serious cases," and a question on the "current backlog date for follow-up ... COVID Death, COVID Serious" (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 351). |
| 22 Mar 2022 | Sends modification 00006 (surge beyond 26 Aug 2022) for signature (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 353). |
Post. Statistician, Immunization Safety Office, DHQP, CDC (her signature, FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 339); v-safe and VAERS (MMWR co-author)
Chain of command. Works under Shimabukuro and Su.
| 10-18 Dec 2020 | Coordinates with FDA (Zinderman, Woo, Baumblatt, Alimchandani) and the contractor on how the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines appear in the VAERS system (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 112 to FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 118). |
| 29 Dec 2020 | Sends the contractor the draft clinical follow-up guidance (NURFU) and notes "we have been receiving more pregnancy reports than expected" (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 96). |
| 22 Feb 2021 | Reviews the contractor's surge proposal: "I know we are still waiting to get more detail on the backlog reports"; asks that the proposal document the prioritisation of reports consistently (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 194). |
Status. ISO, DHQP, NCEZID on May and October 2026 papers.
Post. ISO/DHQP, CDC; VAERS follow-up requests and website text
Chain of command. Works under Su.
| 15 Dec 2020 | Receives CDC's Office of General Counsel (Kevin Malone) on the VAERS website text for COVID-19 reporting requirements (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 311). |
| 29 Dec 2020 | On the processing-prioritisation guidance thread with the contractor (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 96). |
| 21 Apr 2021 | Answers Idaho's epidemiology field officer, who asked whether CDC had received two myocarditis reports after second Pfizer doses: "I did not find either of these reports in VAERS yet, but due to processing delays, VAERS may have received them but not processed them yet. To date, CDC vaccine safety monitoring systems have not found evidence of a concerning pattern of reports of myocarditis after COVID-19 vaccination." (FOIA 23-00056, PDF p. 903). Shimabukuro and Su are copied. |
| 10 May 2021 | Writes to the contractor: "VAERS ... is a COVID vaccine report of death that was received 3/25/21 and has no follow up started. Please have records requested." (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 281). That is 46 days after receipt; the contract clock for starting follow-up on a death was one business day (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 11; SOP, Table 4.4). |
Status. ISO on a June 2026 paper.
Post. Vaccine Safety Team, CDC COVID-19 Vaccine Task Force; v-safe (MMWR co-author)
Chain of command. Works under Shimabukuro.
| Dec 2020-Feb 2021 | Addressee on the launch emails and on 8 Feb 2021 (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 112, FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 460). |
| 19 Oct 2021 | Presents "Update on CDC COVID-19 vaccine safety monitoring systems: V-safe and VAERS" to the NAIIS Summit (deck). |
Status. ISO on 2025 and 2026 papers.
Post. ISO/DHQP, CDC; budget and contract paperwork for the VAERS surge
Chain of command. Within ISO; works with Roberts.
| 12-18 Feb 2021 | Handles the cost-review notifications for the surge modification (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 466 to FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 473). |
| 22 Feb 2021 | Copied on the decision for the 25,000-a-week surge (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 194). |
| 22 Mar 2022 | Copied on the surge extension (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 353). |
Post. Team Lead / Contracting Officer, Branch 3 Team 2, Office of Acquisition Services (OAS), Office of Financial Resources (OFR), Office of the Chief Operating Officer (OCOO), CDC (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 205)
Chain of command. Outside the program chain: OAS under OFR under OCOO. Takes the requirement from the program office (Roberts, Su, Shimabukuro).
| 27 Jan 2021 | Receives Roberts's note that the contractor's capacity must increase on both contracts (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 476). |
| 9 Feb 2021 | Drafts a change to the contract's quality-assurance requirement: "We feel like this should free up necessary resources to assist with our backlog of reports." (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 205). |
| 10 Feb 2021 | Receives the contractor's 70,000-report letter (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 204). |
| 12 Feb 2021 | "I just got off a phone call with the program office and we would like to receive a technical ... and a price proposal to add two CLINs ... the backlog requirement for domestic and foreign reports (estimated 3 - 6 months to complete) and ... a 6 month surge ... CDC believes that the reports will be in the range of 4,000 - 5,000 a day." (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 199). |
| 19 Feb-4 Mar 2021 | Forwards the final proposal to Roberts, Su and Shimabukuro, then executes Modifications 00003 and 00004 with the contractor (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 195, FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 424 to FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 431). |
Post. Contract specialists, OAS/OFR/OCOO, CDC
Chain of command. Work under Denis.
| Jan-Mar 2021 | Crockett receives Roberts's 26 Jan 2021 capacity warning (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 476); Amador processes and countersigns the backlog and surge modifications (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 424 to FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 431). |
Post. ISO/DHQP, CDC. DeStefano was an earlier ISO director (personnel file, 25 Oct 2026).
Chain of command. Within ISO.
| 2015 | DeStefano co-authors the VAERS methods paper with Shimabukuro. |
| 30 Apr 2021 | Licata and Gee co-author the Janssen report with Shimabukuro, Su, Myers and Marquez (MMWR). |
| 16-17 Nov 2022 | Licata finds seven VAERS reports in WONDER that look like EU manufacturer reports and orders the fields SYMPTOM_TEXT, LAB_DATA, CUR_ILL, HISTORY, ALLERGIES and SPLTTYPE blanked for those seven, in WONDER and in the weekly deliveries to HHS and the WHO (FOIA 23-00363, PDF pp. 119-121). |
Status. Gee in ISO on an April 2026 paper; DeStefano last found on a 2023 ISO paper.
Post. Associate Director for Medical Policy, Office of Biostatistics and Epidemiology (OBE), FDA CBER (signature block, Senate PSI Part 1, PDF p. 19)
Chain of command. Reports within CBER under its Director, Peter Marks.
| Dec 2020 | On the launch-week VAERS entry emails with CDC (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 112, FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 115). |
| 12 Mar 2021 | Recipient, with Manette Niu, of Bethany Baer's email that "GDIT VAERS report processing backlogs, and other outside issues, would be important to consider when looking at this data and may not be widely understood outside of DE" (Senate PSI Part 2, PDF p. 162). |
| 2021, undated | Signs the OBE draft asking Ana Szarfman of FDA's CDER to stop creating and sending data-mining reports on COVID-19 vaccine adverse events; the draft says OBE already has "a robust process for continuous monitoring" (Senate PSI Part 1, PDF p. 18 and Senate PSI Part 1, PDF p. 19). |
Post. Office of Biostatistics and Epidemiology (OBE), FDA CBER
Chain of command. Within CBER under Peter Marks.
| 12 Apr 2021 | Asks Ana Szarfman whether a statistical problem affects the data-mining results: "As you know, there is a backlog in VAERS reports with the contractor due to the high volume of reports we are receiving for the COVID-19 vaccines and the prioritization of those vaccine reports." (Senate PSI Part 1, PDF p. 29). |
Status. Last paper found September 2021 (FDA OBE).
Post. OBE, FDA CBER (pharmacovigilance and data mining)
Chain of command. Reports within CBER.
| 12 Mar 2021 | Writes to Zinderman and Niu that the contractor's backlogs "may not be widely understood outside of DE" and questions whether a CDER analyst should have access to the VAERS data in Empirica (Senate PSI Part 2, PDF p. 162). |
Status. Last paper found November 2022 (FDA OBE).
Post. FDA CBER staff on the VAERS COVID-19 emails
Chain of command. Within CBER.
| Nov 2020-Feb 2021 | Baumblatt is copied on the contractor's monthly report cover emails to the CDC contracting officer's representative (GDIT report, PDF p. 1 to GDIT report, PDF p. 10); with Woo and Alimchandani she is on the December 2020 launch-week emails (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 112). |
| 23 Jun 2021 | Nair, Zinderman, Woo and Mba-Jonas are copied on the request that the contractor prioritise 80 Guillain-Barre reports (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 324). |
Status. Baumblatt moved to NIAID by mid-2024. Forshee at FDA CBER in September 2026.
Post. Director, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (started January 2021, hearing); head of the agency that runs VAERS and v-safe
Chain of command. Top of the CDC chain. Gives welcome remarks at the 1 March 2021 ACIP meeting at which Shimabukuro presents (ACIP summary, PDF p. 7).
| 27 Apr 2021 | Henry Walke forwards her the "Myocarditis" thread that includes Shimabukuro's "Please read: Myocarditis" reply, "See below" (FOIA 23-00056, PDF p. 945). |
| 14 May 2021 | Receives an internal CDC notification that reports of myocarditis "are rare given the number of vaccine doses administered" (Senate PSI report, PDF p. 14). |
| 23 May 2021 | Henry Walke emails her the "latest" draft Health Alert Network (HAN) bulletin on myocarditis. She asks whether it will be a full HAN and says "I'm fine with how this reads . . . grateful" (Senate PSI report, PDF p. 15). |
| 25 May 2021 | Benjamin Wakana of the White House emails her and other health officials a 17-page "tough" questions-and-answers document that includes myocarditis risks (Senate PSI report, PDF p. 22). |
| 26 May 2021 | Abbigail Tumpey sends her a "preview" of the HAN with benefit-risk language she apparently requested (Senate PSI report, PDF p. 22). Woodcock writes: "Rochelle, do you know that FDA does not concur with issuance of the myocarditis HAN as written?" She answers: "Just coming from a hearing and trying to get up to speed. Will hold until we chat." Woodcock replies: "I just learned that this was about to go out, despite our concerns" (PSICOVID_00005565). Officials then know the HAN is "nix[ed]" (Senate PSI report, PDF p. 27); CDC posts "clinical considerations" on 28 May (Senate PSI report, PDF p. 28). |
| 4 Nov 2021 | Senate HELP, asked whether side effects are being captured and made public: "We have the most robust vaccine safety system than we have ever had in this Country ... VAERS ... has over 600,000 reports publically available ... V-safe ... over 9.5 million people ... This is the most robust vaccine safety system that has ever been documented." (S. Hrg. 117-202, not under oath). By then the backlog had run from December 2020 to 30 May 2021 (GDIT report, PDF p. 24). |
| 11 Jan 2022 | Senate HELP, on VAERS death reports: "Absolutely, yes ... We collect this data ... And every one of those is adjudicated." (hearing, PDF p. 72, not under oath). |
| 13 Jun 2023 | House Select Subcommittee, under oath: "We at CDC have a responsibility to comb through every single one of them to review the medical charts and to see if they are related." (hearing, PDF p. 38). CDC's own procedure, 2 Feb 2022: "Medical records are requested only for serious reports, or upon request by CDC" (SOP, PDF p. 12). The contractor, December 2021: "Per CDC request, we are not following up on COVID non-serious cases" (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 351). |
Status. Told the House Select Subcommittee on 13 June 2023 that she was stepping down as CDC Director.
Post. Director, Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research (CBER), FDA; FDA's half of VAERS
Chain of command. Heads CBER, which houses OBE (Zinderman, Niu, Baer, Nair, Forshee).
| 11 May 2021 | Senate HELP: "our safety surveillance systems are doing what they're supposed to do" (Rev transcript). Two of his own staff had written about the backlog on 12 March and 12 April. |
| 27 May 2021 | Writes to Walensky, copying Woodcock: "I need to ask for your patience with me. We still have concerns here if myocarditis and pericarditis have not actually signaled. This is different from the half pager that we spoke about and is pretty close to the original HAN. Can you help me understand why we are doing this when pediatricians and others in the community already seem to be aware?" (Senate PSI report, PDF p. 27). |
| 10 Aug 2021 | Tells Rep. Debbie Lesko by telephone that four deaths were confirmed as caused by the vaccine (her account, hearing, PDF p. 29). |
| 15 Feb 2024 | House Select Subcommittee, under oath, asked whether the government was prepared for the avalanche of VAERS reports: "the avalanche of reports was tremendous. And it, again, required retasking people on the fly" (hearing, PDF p. 17). |
| 12 Feb 2025 | With Daniel Jernigan, FDA Voices: "a backlog of serious reports was cleared within a month and reports of non-serious events were cleared within three months" (FDA Voices). |
Post. Acting Commissioner, FDA (title at the 4 Nov 2021 hearing, S. Hrg. 117-202)
Chain of command. Heads the agency above CBER.
| 26 May 2021 | To Walensky: "Rochelle, do you know that FDA does not concur with issuance of the myocarditis HAN as written?" and, after Walensky's reply, "I just learned that this was about to go out, despite our concerns" (PSICOVID_00005565). The HAN is dropped for a website page. |
| 4 Nov 2021 | Testifies at the same Senate HELP hearing as Walensky. No VAERS backlog statement from her appears in the hearing text read. |
Post. Director, National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases (NCEZID), CDC (2024 hearing and 2025 FDA Voices byline); NCEZID is the center that houses DHQP and ISO
Chain of command. Between ISO and the CDC Director.
| 15 Feb 2024 | Testifies with Marks under oath that CDC runs "five different systems," the first being VAERS, "essentially an open door to get those reports in" (hearing, PDF p. 19). |
| 12 Feb 2025 | Co-author of the FDA Voices post with Marks. |
Status. The documents read do not say who directed NCEZID in 2021. CDC's leadership page of 16 Oct 2026 lists Christopher R. Braden as NCEZID Acting Director.
Post. Incident manager for CDC's COVID-19 response in May 2021 (Senate PSI report); director of CDC's Office of Readiness and Response (CDC leadership page, entry dated 18 Jan 2024)
Chain of command. Reports to the CDC Director, Rochelle Walensky, to whom he sends the myocarditis material.
| 27 Apr 2021 | Forwards Walensky the "Myocarditis" thread with Shimabukuro's "Please read: Myocarditis" reply: "See below" (FOIA 23-00056, PDF p. 945). |
| 23 May 2021 | Emails Walensky the "latest" draft HAN on myocarditis; she replies "I'm fine with how this reads . . . grateful" (Senate PSI report, PDF p. 15). |
| 26-28 May 2021 | The HAN is "nix[ed]" and CDC posts "clinical considerations" instead (Senate PSI report, PDF p. 27, p. 28). |
Post. CDC official, Center for Surveillance, Epidemiology and Laboratory Services (address code), on the myocarditis communication
Chain of command. Works to the CDC Director's office on the HAN.
| 26 Apr 2021 | Copied on the "Please read: Myocarditis" thread with Shimabukuro (FOIA 23-00056, PDF p. 945). |
| 26 May 2021 | Emails Walensky and others a "preview" of the HAN still in clearance; compared with the 23 May draft, it has more language that the benefits of vaccination outweigh the risks (Senate PSI report, PDF p. 22). |
Post. Consultant to the Defense Health Agency (DHA), as the Senate PSI report describes her
Chain of command. Outside CDC; presents DoD's case series to CDC's vaccine safety work group.
| 12 Apr 2021 | Tells the work group that V-safe offers only ten pre-programmed symptoms and cannot see cardiac events; her last slide: "If you do not ask, you will not see it, but does that mean it does not exist?" (Senate PSI report, PDF p. 46). CDC's notes: "DHA feels there is a high likelihood that cardiac symptoms following COVID-19 vaccination represent a hypersensitivity eosinophilic myocarditis" (Senate PSI report, PDF p. 13). |
Post. General Dynamics Information Technology (GDIT), VAERS contractor; project manager who sent the monthly reports to Roberts with copies to Su, Baumblatt, Crockett, Johnson, Lotspeich and Lemieux (GDIT report, PDF p. 1)
Chain of command. GDIT reports to Roberts; the contract office is Denis.
| 29 Dec 2020 | GDIT to CDC: "consistently receiving over 1,000 Covid-19 reports per day" (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 96). |
| 10 Feb 2021 | Contracts administrators: "GDIT is unable to process all of the incoming reports in a timely manner ... significantly above the government's 'worst case scenario' estimate of 1,000 covid-19 reports per day ... an ever growing backlog of expired unprocessed reports, currently over 70,000." (FOIA 23-00363, PDF p. 204). |
| Dec 2020-Jul 2022 | Monthly reports: unable to meet processing timeframes (Dec 2020, GDIT report, PDF p. 8); backlog 93,940 on 1 Mar 2021 and completed 30 May 2021 (GDIT report, PDF p. 17, GDIT report, PDF p. 24); "the VAERS infrastructure needs an upgrade" (Jul 2022, GDIT report, PDF p. 68). |
These names appear in the address lines of the 478-page CDC release (mass notifications from the contract office excluded). Pages is the number of PDF pages on which the name appears in a From, To or Cc line.
| Name | Office | Pages | First-last page |
|---|---|---|---|
| Traci Sinetta Roberts | CDC ISO/DHQP | 146 | 13-478 |
| John Su | CDC ISO/DHQP | 101 | 80-478 |
| Elaine R. Miller | CDC ISO/DHQP | 54 | 96-478 |
| Paige L. Marquez | CDC ISO/DHQP | 47 | 96-471 |
| Nathan Amador | CDC contracts (OAS) | 50 | 80-477 |
| Tom Shimabukuro | CDC ISO/DHQP | 29 | 82-460 |
| Bonita C. Johnson | CDC ISO/DHQP | 28 | 86-473 |
| Philip Denis | CDC contracts (OAS) | 31 | 80-477 |
| Pedro Moro | CDC ISO/DHQP | 23 | 175-388 |
| Jane Baumblatt | FDA CBER | 23 | 112-460 |
| Jane Woo | FDA CBER | 12 | 112-460 |
| Craig E Zinderman | FDA CBER | 10 | 112-460 |
| Tanya R. Myers | CDC ISO/DHQP | 10 | 112-460 |
| Ruth Gallego | CDC ISO/DHQP | 9 | 303-478 |
| Kerry Welsh | FDA CBER | 9 | 112-460 |
| David Menschik | FDA CBER | 9 | 112-460 |
| Meghna Alimchandani | FDA CBER | 8 | 112-460 |
| Crystal Brown | CDC/OCOO/OFR/OFAS | 5 | 13-110 |
| Lindsey M. Crockett | CDC contracts (OAS) | 6 | 80-476 |
| Kevin M. Malone | CDC/OCOO/OGC | 5 | 305-312 |
| Valerie Morelli | CDC/DDID/NCIRD/ISD | 5 | 305-311 |
| Rae Sparrow | CDC/OCOO/OFR/OBS | 3 | 466-469 |
| Melisa L. Thombley | CDC/OCOO/OGC | 4 | 305-309 |
| Nancy Gallagher | CDC ISO/DHQP | 2 | 88-473 |
| Charles Licata | CDC ISO/DHQP | 3 | 119-121 |
| Tara Johnson | CDC/DDNID/NCEH/DEHSP | 2 | 282-283 |
| Angela Fedrick | CDC ISO/DHQP | 2 | 466-467 |
| Nettie D. Berry | CDC/OCOO/OFR/OFAS | 2 | 13-14 |
| Amelia Jazwa | CDC ISO/DHQP | 2 | 282-283 |
| Christopher P. Schembri | CDC ISO/DHQP | 2 | 89-90 |
| Narayan Nair | FDA CBER | 2 | 324-329 |
| Altovise Floyd | CDC/OCOO/OFR/OBS | 2 | 467-469 |
| Belinda B. Hammond | CDC/OCOO/OFR/OBS | 2 | 467-469 |
| Cheryl Benitez | CDC/OCOO/OFR/OBS | 2 | 467-469 |
| Donna David | CDC/OCOO/OFR/OBS | 2 | 467-469 |
Raw per-person search results from the project database (waves.db) are kept in research_dumps/vaers_enterprise_20261025/accountability/raw/; the sweep script is data/vaers_enterprise/accountability_sweep.py. Corrections: see the article.
FCHDS · v2026-10-25