The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) executive who was captured on hidden camera saying the U.S. government plans to push annual COVID-19 shots is claiming the way the video footage was presented is misleading.
Christopher Cole, executive officer of the medical countermeasures initiative at the FDA, told a Project Veritas reporter that President Joe Biden “wants to inoculate as many people as possible,” adding: “You’ll have to get an annual shot. I mean, it hasn’t been formally announced yet because they don’t want to rile everyone up.”
Cole also said that the FDA was going to grant emergency use authorization (EUA) for Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine for children 6 months of age to 4. “Just from everything I heard,” he said, describing the EUA process as having a lower bar than the regular approval process.
The FDA was poised this month to authorize Pfizer’s jab for young children but announced on Feb. 11 officials were delaying the decision.
Cole responded to a query from The Epoch Times on LinkedIn, taking issue with the two videos Project Veritas released showing him talking about vaccines and related matters.
The videos “were from an edited private conversation and done without my permission or knowledge,” said Cole. “Partial statements were taken to summarize points completely changing them in an effort to sensationalize the article.”
An article published on the website of Project Veritas summarizing portions of the conversation “is not factually correct and does not represent the full conversation and is misleading in the portrayal of the conversation,” he added.
Asked which parts were not factually correct, Cole said he was told to refer all media inquiries to the FDA’s media office. “So I cannot respond at this point in time,” he said.
“We stand by our accurate reporting of the words said by Mr. Cole on video tape,” a Project Veritas spokesman told The Epoch Times in an email.
An FDA spokesperson declined to answer a number of questions, including why the agency seemed to cast doubt on whether it was actually Cole in the videos.
“The person purportedly in the video does not work on vaccine matters and does not represent the views of the FDA,” a spokesperson told The Epoch Times in an earlier statement.
The initiative Cole oversees is described as “ensur[ing] that medical countermeasures—including drugs, vaccines and diagnostic tests— … are safe, effective, and secure.” The FDA website says the program is involved in work relating to COVID-19 vaccines.
Cole told Project Veritas that his agency “oversees vaccines,” including vaccine approval.
This is an excerpt from The Epoch Times.
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