A. Morgan Selleck, MD, assistant professor at UNC Medical School (left) and University of Arizona associate professor Shaowen Bao | UNC School of Medicine / American Tinnitus Association
A. Morgan Selleck, MD, assistant professor at UNC Medical School (left) and University of Arizona associate professor Shaowen Bao | UNC School of Medicine / American Tinnitus Association
Less than a month after a University of North Carolina (UNC) researcher co-authored a paper about potential links between the COVID-19 vaccine and tinnitus, an Old North News analysis found 506 North Carolina reports of post-vaccine tinnutus to the Center for Disease Control's (CDC) vaccine adverse events reporting system.
"Overall, our department has seen almost double the number of patients (n = 1847 of which 1254 were vaccinated during that time frame) with tinnitus complaints in the thirteen months after the three COVID-19 vaccines became available in the United States compared with the number of patients seen for tinnitus in a similar timeframe before the pandemic (December 1, 2018-December 31, 2019) (n = 1017 of which 642 were vaccinated in the first 13 months of vaccine availability)," said a paper co-authored by A. Morgan Selleck, MD, an assistant professor at UNC School of Medicine.
Selleck is co-director of the Neurotology/Otology and Skull Base Surgery Fellowship at the UNC School of Medicine's Department of Otolaryngology/Head & Neck Surgery. The paper, entitled, "Tinnitus cases after COVID-19 vaccine administration, one institution's observations," was published on March 24, 2023.
On April 23, NBC News reported that, “Shaowen Bao, an associate professor in the physiology department of the College of Medicine at the University of Arizona, Tucson, believes that ongoing inflammation, especially in the brain or spinal cord, may be to blame" for the tinnitus.
Tinnitus is often described as a “ringing in the ears,” but can also contain the symptoms of a buzzing or hissing sounds. The American Tinnitus Association (ATA) said tinnitus is “the perception of sound in the absence of external sound stimuli.”
The World Health Organization reported that tinnitus affects approximately 15-20% of the population.
Bao reportedly surveyed 398 members of a Facebook group “of people who developed tinnitus after getting a COVID vaccine.”
“One man told Bao that he couldn’t hear the car radio over the noise in his head while driving,” reported NBC News. “Along with ringing in their ears, participants reported a range of other symptoms, including headaches, dizziness, vertigo, ear pain, anxiety and depression. Significantly more people first developed tinnitus after the first dose of the vaccine, compared with the second.”
“This suggests ‘that the vaccine is interacting with pre-existing risk factors for tinnitus. If you have the risk factor, you will probably get it from the first dose,’” Bao said.
Bao has yet to publish his findings from the survey.
Bao is a member of the board of directors of the ATA. He received his doctoral degree in neuroscience from University of Southern California, and postdoctoral training on central auditory plasticity at University of California San Francisco, according to his bio page on the ATA website.
An Old North News analysis of data reported by the CDC's Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) finds a total of 17,440 cases of tinnitus reported in the U.S. following the COVID 19 vaccine as of April 14, 2023.
506 of those cases were in Arizona.
—
How many VAERS reports of tinnitus following the COVID-19 vaccine have been made in each state and U.S. territory?
Alerts Sign-up