Breaking down and understanding what's going on.
All views and info here are just my personal take—this is only a place to jot them down. Go ask your own ‘quacks’ or do your own reading.
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/08916934.2025.2551517#d1e379
The authors continue a pattern sometimes used by people attempting to show vaccine harm: misrepresenting VAERS data.
In support of their statement “These percentages far exceed the upper limit for the expected percentage of SAEs in any given VAERS data set as per the VAERS data use guide,” the authors appear to be drawing on the (outdated) November 2020 VAERS Data Use Guide, which states:
> "About 85–90% of vaccine adverse event reports concern relatively minor events… The remaining reports (less than 15%) describe serious events, such as hospitalizations, life-threatening illnesses, or deaths."
However, in the same document, just one page later, the guide explicitly cautions:
> "Accumulations of events reported to a passive surveillance system do not allow incidence rate calculations due to the generally unknown extent of under-reporting as well as lack of information on the number of people being vaccinated."
So the authors have presented the “<15% serious” description as though it were a regulatory upper limit for expected rates, when the VAERS guide itself warns that incidence or expected values cannot be calculated from VAERS data.
Simple takeaway
Authors’ claim: “Serious events are higher than the VAERS guide’s 15% limit—so vaccines must be causing more harm.”
Counter-point: “That 15% was never meant as a limit. VAERS data can’t be used to set exact percentages or prove harm. The authors are using the number incorrectly.”
Reports are not proof the vaccine caused the event.
Because reporting is voluntary, many events are missed and we don’t know the total number of people vaccinated.
The VAERS guide itself says you cannot treat that as a rule or a maximum rate.
Authors’ side: They used that “less than 15 % serious” as if it were an official upper limit. They compared today’s reports to it and said, “Look, serious events are higher than the limit—vaccines must be riskier.”
Critics’ side (the text you posted): They argue the authors are misusing the data, because the VAERS manual clearly warns you cannot calculate true rates or set a limit from these reports.
Q. If VAERS data cannot be used to calculate true rates, how can anyone be sure serious vaccine injuries aren’t being missed or hidden?
Verified: Health agencies use multiple active-surveillance systems (for example, Vaccine Safety Datalink, BEST, PRISM) that track millions of medical records in real time, not just voluntary reports.
Unverified: Whether every single serious case is detected; no system guarantees 100 % capture.If VAERS accepts reports from anyone without proof, how do we know a rise in reports isn’t just more people submitting, not more injuries?
Q. Why does the VAERS guide mention ‘less than 15 % serious events’ if that number isn’t supposed to guide expectations? What is the purpose of publishing that figure?
Verified: That number is a historical description of past reporting patterns, offered to give readers a sense of scale, not as a regulatory limit.
Unverified: Exact reasoning of the original authors beyond descriptive context.
Q. If reporting is voluntary and under-reporting is known, how can health agencies claim vaccines are safe without more mandatory surveillance?
Verified: Claims of safety are based mainly on pre-licensure trials, epidemiological studies, and active monitoring systems, not raw VAERS counts.
Unverified: Whether the level of surveillance satisfies everyone’s personal safety threshold.
Q. What independent checks exist to ensure that serious events in VAERS are investigated and not dismissed as coincidence?
Verified: Serious VAERS reports are followed by medical record review, death-certificate/autopsy matching, and analysis by CDC/FDA physicians.
Unverified: Full transparency of every investigation to the public.
Q. Why is it acceptable to rule out causation for most reports so quickly if the system is supposed to be an early warning?
Verified: VAERS is an early signal tool. Rapid screening prevents false alarms while still flagging patterns for deeper study (for example, myocarditis signals were detected this way).
Unverified: The subjective speed of individual case assessments.
Based on how VAERS is designed and what the VAERS guide itself says, the critics are correct here.
The “<15 %” was never meant as a regulatory cap.
VAERS data by itself can’t tell you how common side effects really are.
So the argument that “serious events are above 15 %, therefore vaccines are more dangerous” isn’t supported by how the system works.