Attorney General Ken Paxton is persisting with his lawsuit against the pharmaceutical company Pfizer for “knowingly misrepresenting” the efficacy of its COVID-19 vaccine.
On Wednesday, Texas’ top prosecutor filed a notice of appeal in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, urging the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals to take up the case.
“Pfizer repeatedly and knowingly misrepresented the effectiveness and safety of their COVID-19 vaccine and pressured Americans to take the shot without full knowledge of the risks,” stated Paxton in a press release.
“When consumers questioned the effectiveness and safety of the vaccine, Pfizer sought to silence them—prioritizing profits over the truth,” he continued. “I will not stop until Pfizer is held accountable for deceptively pushing its COVID-19 vaccine on consumers.”
Senior District Judge Sam R. Cummings granted Pfizer’s motion to dismiss the original November 2023 lawsuit on December 30.
Cummings specifically wrote that the company is entitled to legal immunity under the federal Public Readiness and Emergency (PREP) Act, part of the Department of Defense Appropriations Act passed in 2006.
He also asserted that certain provisions of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act preempted accusations made by the Texas attorney general’s office, and that its claims did not fall under any of the laws’ exceptions.
Paxton’s office contends that Pfizer violated the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act by misrepresenting its vaccine as possessing a 95 percent efficacy rate.
According to the office, this metric is based on misleading “relative risk reduction” statistics for vaccinated individuals generated by the company’s initial clinical trials.
Paxton’s office argued that prior to making its efficacy claims, Pfizer had already been put on notice “that vaccine protection could not accurately be predicted beyond two months,” and that the company ignored FDA publications warning against use of the term “relative risk reduction.”
After efficacy rate claims failed to materialize, Paxton’s office said Pfizer responded by “intimidating those spreading the truth, and by conspiring to censor its critics” through social media platform coercion.
Michelle Evans, political director of Texans for Vaccine Choice, applauded Paxton’s efforts to pursue the case in a federal appeals court despite the district court’s decision to dismiss it.
“Attorney General Paxton is once again demonstrating his commitment to truth and transparency,” said Evans. “TFVC applauds his pursuit of accountability for Big Pharma for its misdeeds, which caused massive harm to thousands of Texans.”
Former Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar initially declared a public health emergency in January 2020 under the Public Health Services Act, which PREP amended.
The declaration was renewed 13 times until its final expiration on May 11, 2023 and coincided with amendments made to PREP to accommodate the declarations.
However, on May 11, 2023, U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra decided to renew PREP-based legal immunity for qualified individuals and entities until December 2024—even after the last public health declaration had expired.
In a Federal Register notice, Becerra argued that COVID-19 “continues to present a credible risk of a future public health emergency.” Then, in early December, Becerra further extended certain liability protections through 2029.
Pfizer, which has worked with BioNTech on its vaccine, produces one of three COVID-19 shots authorized for use in the U.S., along with those produced by Moderna and Novavax.
The emergency use authorization for Johnson & Johnson’s COVID-19 vaccine expired on May 6, 2023. An American Medical Association article noted that its use was linked to the development of rare types of blood clots.
