Do COVID vaccines raise the risk of seizures in children?

Buried in the article tweeted was a study that looked at adverse events following COVID vaccination. Overall, the study did not find any safety concerns with the COVID-19 vaccines in children under the age of 5. The findings are consistent with the results of clinical trials and other safety monitoring systems.

The article in the referenced tweet seemed concerned about the rates of adverse events following vaccination, with special concern that the outcomes of the vaccinated were not compared to those of the unvaccinated. However, the researchers did compare rates of events in the vaccinated to expected rates in the population and found that the events that occurred in the vaccinated children didn’t spark any concern. (The events didn’t happen more often than we would expect them to happen without vaccination.)

According to the study, 247,011 children under the age of 6 received an mRNA vaccine during the 9-month trial period. When you have a study of a quarter million children, you’d expect to have unfortunate events occur–not related to the vaccine. In fact, the article even pointed out cases of hemorrhagic stroke and pulmonary embolism, which the study noted were due to congenital abnormalities and completely unrelated to the vaccine.

As far as seizures, febrile seizures, which are seizures as a result of rapid temperature change, commonly occur in children 6 months-5 years old. They may seem scary, but are generally benign. With a population of 247,000 children, 100 of them having seizures is about what we would expect to see in a group of children that size.