Healthcare & Pharmaceuticals U.S. CDC looking into heart inflammation in some young vaccine recipients

Some teenagers and young adults who received COVID-19 vaccines experienced heart inflammation, a U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advisory group said, recommending further study of the rare condition.

The CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices in a statement dated May 17 said it had looked into reports that a few young vaccine recipients, predominantly adolescents and young adults, and predominantly male, developed myocarditis, an inflammation of the heart muscle.

CDC monitoring systems had not found more cases than would be expected in the population, but members of the committee on vaccinations felt that healthcare providers should be made aware of the reports of the "potential adverse event," the committee said in the statement.

Dr. Amesh Adalja, senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, said vaccines are known to cause myocarditis and would be important to monitor to see if it is causally related to the vaccine. It is important to look at the risk-benefit ratio, he added. "Vaccines are going to unequivocally be much more beneficial outweighing this very low, if conclusively established, risk."

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