2024-2025 COVID Vaccine Linked to Lower Heart Event Risk in Veterans

Researchers examining Department of Veterans Affairs health records found that veterans who received the 2024-2025 COVID-19 vaccine alongside a flu shot had a lower risk of serious heart-related events linked to COVID-19. The study tracked nearly 350,000 veterans who received both vaccines on the same day and nearly 700,000 who received only the flu vaccine.

Within eight months, the COVID-vaccinated group showed a 37.7 percent relative reduction in COVID-associated major adverse cardiovascular events.

The same analysis reported a 57.9 percent lower risk of cardiovascular death, a 38.5 percent lower risk of heart attack, and a 41.9 percent lower risk of hospitalization for heart failure among those who received the COVID vaccine. The reduction in stroke risk did not reach statistical significance.

The benefit appeared largest among adults age 75 and older and among those with existing health conditions. In people over 75, the vaccine showed 50.7 percent effectiveness at preventing COVID-associated major adverse cardiovascular events.

Because the research was observational, it could establish only an association rather than prove that the vaccine caused the lower risk. A cardiologist not involved in the study noted that the overall benefit was smaller than in earlier studies, possibly reflecting milder recent COVID variants and widespread prior immunity.

The cardiologist added that acute inflammation from infections such as COVID-19 can raise clotting risk and destabilize arterial plaques, and that vaccines may reduce infection severity and subsequent inflammation.