COVID-19 Vaccine Recipients Had Lower Rates of Non-COVID-19 Mortality

In a cohort study of 6.4 million COVID-19 vaccinees and 4.6 million demographically similar unvaccinated persons, recipients of the Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna, or Janssen vaccines had lower non–COVID-19 mortality risk than did the unvaccinated comparison groups, reported the U.S. CDC on October 22, 2021.

And, there is no increased risk for mortality among COVID-19 vaccine recipients.

This finding published in the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report reinforces the safety profile of currently approved COVID-19 vaccines in the U.S.

The lower mortality risk after COVID-19 vaccination suggests substantial healthy vaccinee effects (i.e., vaccinated persons tend to be more beneficial than unvaccinated persons), which will be explored in future analyses.

Among persons aged 12–17 years, mortality risk did not differ between Pfizer-BioNTech vaccinees and unvaccinated persons, with only 12 deaths occurring in this age group during the study period.

The stratified analyses by age, sex, race, and ethnicity showed that vaccinated adults had lower mortality than unvaccinated adults across subgroups.

The findings in this report are subject to at least four limitations, such as the study was observational, and individual-level confounders that were not adjusted for might affect mortality risk, including baseline health status, underlying conditions, health care utilization, and socioeconomic status.

Despite limitations, this study had several strengths. First, this was a cohort study with a large, sociodemographically diverse population, and it encompassed a study period of >7 months.

This cohort study found lower rates of non–COVID-19 mortality among vaccinated persons than unvaccinated persons in a large, sociodemographically diverse population during December 2020–July 2021. Thus, there is no increased risk for mortality among COVID-19 vaccine recipients.

This finding reinforces the safety profile of currently approved COVID-19 vaccines in the U.S.

Corresponding author: Stanley Xu, [email protected].