An Army physician selected by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to advise Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said she is investigating whether thousands of service member deaths reported to a federal vaccine-safety database were caused by COVID-19 vaccines, an inquiry that rests on unverified reports and that the Pentagon’s own recent analysis has not supported.
Lt. Col. Theresa Long disclosed the role in an Aug. 14 deposition obtained by Politico and, separately, by the New York Times. Long, who is board-certified in aerospace medicine and holds a master’s degree in public health, said Hegseth tapped her for the detail as Kennedy’s senior medical military adviser while also reporting to the Defense Department.
The New York Times reported that she has no specialized training in vaccines or viruses.
Long testified that she is reviewing roughly 55,000 adverse-event reports and 2,544 death reports involving service members that were submitted to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System, or VAERS. She said she hoped to complete the work within a year.
VAERS is an open system that anyone can submit to, and a report of a death following vaccination does not establish that the vaccine caused it.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which co-manages the system, states that its reports alone cannot be used to determine whether a vaccine caused a health problem. The 2,544 figure represents deaths reported after vaccination, not deaths shown to have been caused by it.
Claims Made in Lt. Col. Long’s Deposition
Long made two claims in her testimony that go further than the reports themselves. She said she had personal knowledge of 28 service members whose deaths resulted from the COVID-19 vaccination.
No supporting medical files, autopsy findings, or causality assessments have been made public, and the claim is attributed to her testimony rather than established as fact.
She also testified that COVID-19 vaccines caused pregnancy loss among service members at a rate of about 82 percent. The Defense Department’s own research contradicts that assertion.
In a March 2026 report to Congress, the department said its analyses found no association between COVID-19 vaccination, including during pregnancy, and adverse pregnancy outcomes such as stillbirth, pre-term labor, pre-eclampsia and premature rupture of membranes.
Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth hosts Speaker of the House Rep. Mike Johnson and members of Congress for a visit at the Pentagon, Washington, D.C., April 3, 2025. (DOD photo by U.S. Navy Petty Officer 1st Class Alexander Kubitza)
Pentagon’s Data Shows
That report is the second the department has submitted to Congress under a 2024 law requiring annual study of post-vaccination health. It examined the incidence of 17 medical conditions among active-duty troops.
They found that the COVID-19 vaccination was associated with a short-term increase in myocarditis and pericarditis within 21 days. This was consistent with known vaccine safety findings. Those increases were smaller than those following SARS-CoV-2 infection and were not seen beyond that three-week window.
Adjusted figures showed myocarditis roughly twice as likely after vaccination and about 14 times as likely after infection.
Across the 17 conditions studied, the report found that infection was associated with higher incidence than vaccination for 16 of the 17 conditions. It also found that no condition had its highest rate among troops who had been vaccinated but not infected.
This means a person was much more likely to develop that medical condition from catching the actual virus than from getting the vaccine.
The report was designed to measure the incidence of specified conditions, not to conduct a dedicated analysis of the 2,544 death reports, so it does not settle the question of deaths in either direction.
However, it has not produced evidence supporting claims of widespread vaccine-related harm among service members. The department has acknowledged ordinary limitations in its data, including the possibility that conditions are miscoded, under-reported or over-reported, which is the kind of concern Long has said justifies a fresh review.
The Pentagon and HHS did not immediately respond to Military.com’s requests for comment. This story will be updated with any response.
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