Age: 48
At this point I am not available for an in-person spoken submission to parliament.
Vaccination: Pfizer, 1st December 2021 and then 22nd December 2021. I took the vaccine as I wanted to travel to Australia to see my family after years of lockdown, as at the time the border was closed to unvaccinated non-citizens (I am a permanent resident, not an NZ citizen). So I consider myself to have been mandated by stealth, noting that NZ citizens were not required to be vaccinated to re-enter NZ at the time. That was both unscientific and discriminatory.
Injury Details: After my first dose of Pfizer in December 2021, I experienced fainting episodes and irregular heartbeat. The first time I exercised after vaccination I felt like I was going to die, experiencing severe exercise intolerance. I immediately sought medical advice and my GP ran various tests, finding nothing overtly wrong. It was recommended that I receive the second dose. Having improved somewhat I did so, much to my lasting regret. After the second dose I experienced painful heart beats, pounding heart, breathlessness / chest pressure, skipped heartbeats and bradycardia. Again I saw my GP, who did not find anything overtly wrong with me. But these problems persisted for many months, with my heartbeat dropping into the mid 40’s every day, mid-morning, while absolutely pounding just sitting still. After several doctor’s visits my GP referred to me to a public cardiologist, who dismissed my case as not being related to vaccination – without even seeing me, let alone examining me.
Prior to vaccination I had never experienced any heart problems in my life.
I also developed a severe right-side headache several days after the second vaccination, like a knitting needle being pushed through the back of my eye. That persisted for weeks and still flares up occasionally.
I submitted adverse event reports to CARM for both doses and was never contacted about them. I have submitted a follow-up report, detailing the continuation of my problems now over 15 months, and have never heard back. I then emailed them to ask how this can be, serious and chronic symptoms they are not following up on, and received no acknowledgement or reply. We were promised rigorous post-marketing surveillance, which as best I can see is not being done. How can it be done if there is no follow up? In which case, how can claims of the vaccine’s safety and lack of long-term side effects be taken seriously?
Some weeks after my second dose I developed a terrible pain in my left armpit (administration was via left arm), which spread throughout my shoulder and across my chest. Eventually I was diagnosed with costochondritis. I had stiffness in my left shoulder and severe pain in my sternum and left-side upper ribs, for months. I became unable to exercise, indeed due to pain and heart problems I became fatigued and then sedentary, and put on a great deal of weight.
Over time I experienced some improvement, until suddenly my bradycardia became tachycardia. At the smallest exertion my heartbeat would leap to 110 beats per minute. I felt awful. I asked my GP about how to proceed with a vaccine injury claim, a discussion she seemed very reluctant to engage in. To date no such claim has been filed on my behalf, so I have had to bear very significant personal expenses in seeking medical treatment. Having had no help from my GP or the ACC in this matter, I have probably spent upwards of $2000 seeking medical help, including that of a private cardiologist. I was basically forced by the government to take the vaccine with endless promises of its safety and efficacy, and having had an adverse experience I have been all-but ignored by the system and left to fend for myself. This is unfair and immoral, a betrayal.
The private cardiologist did not find any issues with my heart. But I don’t think that my heart per-se is, or ever was the problem. I do not believe I ever had myocarditis or pericarditis, at least that could be clinically diagnosed. Rather I believe my problems to be neurological damage. Australia’s Dr. Kerryn Phelps (former head of the Australian Medical Association) publicised her own vaccine injury, which was fundamentally dysautonomia. In other words, damage to the sympathetic and para-sympathetic nervous systems, specifically the thoracic cardiac nerves, causing symptoms very similar to my own. Indeed as time goes by, it looks to me like the well-known heart issues, while very serious, are not the main problem with this vaccine. It appears to me that neurological damage is far more common, and yet unacknowledged because of the difficulty of diagnosing it. I believe the medical system is aware of this issue and does not publicise it. Meanwhile they continue to push the vaccine, long after its safety and efficacy have come into question. And long after certain claims, like the vaccine always staying in the arm, have been scientifically disproven.
After 15 months or so, I experienced a sudden and seemingly spontaneous improvement, where I felt better enough to begin exercising again. The tachycardia / bradycardia episodes and palpitations appear to be subsiding over time, but there are occasional flare-ups. In any case I am left with chronic pain in my chest and collarbones. I am trying acupuncture to see if that will help. Again, at my own very significant expense. I doubt that I will ever fully recover.
I feel that the government has been deceptive and craven in regards to the vaccine and those injured by it. Some of us ‘did our bit’ for the greater good of the community, perhaps contrary to our will and instincts, and we have been ignored – if not actively disparaged. The inability of the Ministry of Health to acknowledge vaccine injuries, apologise for them, and make even token amends by proactively compensating victims for their resulting medical expenses, leaves me angry, disappointed and disgusted. Instead we have a situation of denial where it is up to victims to navigate a Byzantine system for ACC support where the victim has to prove that the vaccine caused their injury, whether they can even prove they have an injury as many have no visible signs. So much for the ‘be kind’ government, the biggest pack of hypocrites I have ever seen.
I will never take another covid vaccine in my life. All my trust in the medical establishment and the government is gone.