The Swine Flu Fiasco of 1976
How the CDC’s Fear-Mongering and Lies Led to a Public Health Disaster
The welfare of the people in particular has always been the alibi of tyrants.
—Albert Camus
In questions of science, the authority of a thousand is not worth the humble reasoning of a single individual.
—Galileo Galilei
The year was 1976—nearly half a century ago. Alarmed by the sudden appearance of what was believed to be a swine flu virus at a military base in New Jersey, the U.S. government, spearheaded by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), launched an unprecedented national vaccination campaign. Officials, haunted by the memory of the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic, warned that history could be on the verge of repeating itself.
President Gerald Ford took to national television, urging every man, woman, and child to get vaccinated. The message was clear: a deadly pandemic was imminent, and mass immunization was the only way to stop it.
The public, placing their trust in scientific authorities and their elected leaders, responded swiftly. In just a matter of weeks, 46 million Americans rolled up their sleeves for the shot.
But the anticipated pandemic never arrived.
Instead, it was the vaccine itself that triggered a crisis—one that would become a public health debacle and a cautionary tale in the annals of American medicine.
A Pandemic That Wasn’t
The panic began at Fort Dix, New Jersey, when Private David Lewis, a young soldier, collapsed and died following a strenuous forced march. Four other soldiers fell ill around the same time but soon recovered without complications. Even the sergeant who had performed mouth-to-mouth resuscitation on Lewis remained completely unaffected.
Despite the isolated nature of the incident, the CDC—led by Director Dr. David Sencer—treated it as a potential flashpoint for disaster. Seizing on the moment, they announced that the virus detected in Lewis’s tissue was a strain of swine flu, drawing a straight line from that single case to the threat of a looming global pandemic.
But the outbreak never came.
In fact, no additional confirmed cases of swine flu were ever found—not at Fort Dix, not anywhere else in the United States, and not anywhere else in the world.
A Rush to Vaccinate—Without Proper Testing
The CDC’s swine flu vaccination campaign was unprecedented in both speed and scale. But behind the scenes, critical steps were bypassed. The vaccine ultimately administered to the public—designated X-53a—had never undergone field testing before it was rolled out nationwide.
When 60 Minutes correspondent Mike Wallace confronted CDC Director Dr. David Sencer about this omission, the exchange was telling:
Wallace: “Was X-53a ever field-tested?”
Sencer: “I can’t say. I would have to—”
Wallace: “It wasn’t.”
Sencer: “I don’t know.”
The final version of the vaccine—given to the vast majority of the 46 million Americans who were inoculated—had not been part of the clinical trials used to assess safety. Yet, despite this glaring gap, federal officials repeatedly assured the public that the vaccine was “safe and effective.”
The Guillain-Barré Nightmare
Within weeks of the mass vaccination campaign, disturbing reports began to surface. Recipients of the swine flu shot were developing a rare but devastating neurological disorder: Guillain-Barré Syndrome (GBS)—a condition in which the body’s immune system attacks the peripheral nervous system. Symptoms often begin with tingling and weakness in the legs, progressing rapidly to full-body paralysis. In severe cases, GBS can cause respiratory failure, requiring patients to be placed on ventilators. Recovery is unpredictable—some regain function over time, while others are left permanently disabled.
One of the most publicized cases was that of Judy Roberts, a vibrant, healthy schoolteacher who was paralyzed just two weeks after receiving the vaccine.
Roberts: “By the following week, I was totally paralyzed.”
Wallace: “So you will now have a legacy of braces on your legs for the rest of your life?”
Roberts: “Yes.”
Roberts spent six months on a ventilator. Though she eventually regained some mobility, she never fully recovered. The paralysis left her with weakened facial muscles, diminished grip strength, and a lifelong dependence on leg braces.
Roberts: “I can't drink through a straw on the right-hand side. I can’t blow out birthday candles. I don’t whistle anymore.”
Hers was not an isolated case.
By 1979, more than 4,000 injury claims—including approximately 300 deaths—had been filed against the U.S. government. The total damages sought reached $3.5 billion, transforming the swine flu vaccination program from a national health initiative into a legal and medical catastrophe.
The CDC Knew the Risks—And Hid Them
Perhaps the most troubling revelation to emerge from the swine flu fiasco was this: the CDC was aware of potential neurological side effects before the vaccine was widely distributed—but failed to share that information with the public.
Dr. Michael Hattwick, who led the CDC’s swine flu surveillance team at the time, stated this in no uncertain terms:
Hattwick: “Absolutely, we knew from the literature that influenza vaccines had been associated with neurological disorders.”
But when 60 Minutes reporter Mike Wallace questioned CDC Director Dr. David Sencer on national television, the response was striking:
Wallace: “Did anyone ever warn you about neurological risks?”
Sencer: “No.”
Wallace: “Dr. Hattwick says he told you.”
Sencer: “Then he’s lying.”
And yet, a confidential CDC report dated July 1976—months before the first shots were given—explicitly warned of neurological complications as a possible consequence of vaccination. That risk, however, was conspicuously absent from the public consent forms provided to millions of Americans.
In the name of urgency, transparency was sacrificed—and with it, the public’s right to informed consent.
Celebrity Endorsements—Fabricated
To boost public confidence and encourage mass compliance, the CDC launched a high-profile media campaign, claiming that well-known figures such as Mary Tyler Moore, Muhammad Ali, and Walter Cronkite had received the swine flu vaccine. But not all of those endorsements were genuine.
When Mike Wallace pressed Moore on her supposed participation, she made her position clear:
Wallace (to Moore): “Did you take the shot?”
Moore: “No.”
Wallace: “Did you give permission to use your name?”
Moore: “Absolutely not. Never did.”
As concerns about the vaccine's safety grew, many Americans began rethinking their decision to roll up their sleeves. Even celebrities wrestled with the choice—whether to trust official reassurances or rely on their own judgment.
Wallace: “Did you ask your own doctor about taking the swine flu shot?”
Moore: “Yes, and at the time, he thought it might be a good idea. But I resisted it, because I was leery of having the symptoms that sometimes go with that kind of inoculation.”
Wallace: “So you didn't?”
Moore: “No, I didn't.”
Wallace: “Have you spoken to your doctor since?”
Moore: “Yes.”
Wallace: “And?”
Moore: “He's delighted that I didn't take that shot.”
When questioned about the misleading use of celebrity endorsements, CDC director Dr. David Sencer was unable to explain how or why the false claims were made.
A Betrayal of Public Trust
The U.S. government promised swift compensation for vaccine injuries. Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare Joseph Califano even proposed expedited payouts, regardless of whether the government was found negligent.
Califano: “Even if we pay a few people who might not have deserved it, I think justice requires that we promptly pay those who do.”
But most victims waited years—or received nothing. Judy Roberts and her husband Gene were among them.
Gene Roberts: “The government knew the facts but didn’t release them. If they had, people wouldn’t have taken the shot. And now, I will never again take a vaccine just because the government tells me to.”
A Persistent Problem: Influenza Vaccines Still Falling Short
By 1976, deaths from flu and pneumonia had already plummeted 86% since 1900—from 202.2 per 100,000 people to just 28.4 per 100,000. This steep decline occurred before widespread flu vaccination, largely due to improved sanitation, nutrition, and healthcare—not vaccines. Yet the CDC failed to mention this in its push for mass immunization.
Despite decades of research and annual promotion, today’s flu vaccines remain far from the gold standard of disease prevention. A 2023 article published in Cell Host & Microbe[1] offers a remarkably candid assessment: after more than 60 years of global vaccination efforts, influenza vaccines have shown “very little improvement in prevention of infection” and would be considered “inadequate for licensure for most other vaccine-preventable diseases.”
The authors go further, acknowledging a broader and often overlooked truth—that vaccines have consistently struggled to control mucosal respiratory viruses. They conclude that it is “not surprising” that no such virus has ever been effectively managed through vaccination, noting that “durably protective vaccines” for respiratory pathogens “have thus far eluded development.”
These admissions underscore a sobering reality: for all the promises, influenza vaccination remains a deeply flawed tool—one whose limitations are often downplayed in public messaging.
Conclusion: A Warning From History
The 1976 swine flu debacle stands as a sobering warning of what can happen when public health policy is driven more by fear than by solid evidence. A single, unconfirmed outbreak sparked a nationwide vaccination campaign—one that ultimately resulted in thousands of injuries, hundreds of deaths, and a profound erosion of public trust.
As illustrated in the chart above, the CDC withholds much of the critical information and data it possesses. Instead, it positions itself as the unquestioned “expert,” urging the public to accept its guidance without scrutiny.
Today, as new vaccines are rapidly fast-tracked and government assurances flood the media, the lesson remains as urgent as ever:
Demand evidence. Demand transparency.
Or risk repeating the same costly mistakes.
TRANSCRIPT: Swine Flu 1976
MIKE WALLACE: The flu season is upon us. Which type will we worry about this year, and what kind of shots will we be told to take? Remember the swine flu scare of 1976? That was the year the U.S. government told us all that swine flu could turn out to be a killer that could spread across the nation, and Washington decided that every man, woman and child in the nation should get a shot to prevent a nation-wide outbreak, a pandemic.
Well 46 million of us obediently took the shot, and now 4,000 Americans are claiming damages from Uncle Sam amounting to three and a half billion dollars because of what happened when they took that shot. By far the greatest number of the claims - two thirds of them are for neurological damage, or even death, allegedly triggered by the flu shot.
We pick up the story back in 1976, when the threat posed by the swine flu virus seemed very real indeed.
PRESIDENT GERALD FORD; This virus was the cause of a pandemic in 1918 and 1919 that resulted in over half a million deaths in the United States, as well as 20 million deaths around the world.
WALLACE: Thus the U.S. government's publicity machine was cranked into action to urge all America to protect itself against the swine flu menace. (Excerpt from TV commercial urging everyone to get a swine flu shot.) One of those who did roll up her sleeve was Judy Roberts. She was perfectly healthy, an active woman, when, in November of 1976, she took her shot. Two weeks later, she says, she began to feel a numbness starting up her legs.
JUDY ROBERTS: And I joked about it at that time. I said I'll be numb to the knees by Friday if this keeps up. By the following week, I was totally paralyzed.
WALLACE: So completely paralyzed, in fact, that they had to operate on her to enable her to breathe. And for six months, Judy Roberts was a quadriplegic. The diagnosis: A neurological disorder called "Guillain-Barre Syndrome" - GBS for short. These neurological diseases are little understood. They affect people in different ways.
As you can see in these home movies taken by a friend, Judy Roberts' paralysis confined her mostly to a wheelchair for over a year. But this disease can even kill. Indeed, there are 300 claims now pending from the families of GBS victims who died, allegedly as a result of the swine flu shot. In other GBS victims, the crippling effects diminish and all but disappear. But for Judy Roberts, progress back to good health has been painful and partial.
Now, I notice that your smile, Judy, is a little bit constricted.
ROBERTS: Yes, it is.
WALLACE: Is it different from what it used to be?
ROBERTS: Very different, I have a – a greatly decreased mobility in my lips. And I can't drink through a straw on the right-band side. I can't blow out birthday candles. I don't whistle any more, for which my husband is grateful.
WALLACE: It may be a little difficult for you to answer this question, but have you recovered as much as you are going to recover?
ROBERTS: Yes. This - this is it.
WALLACE: So you will now have a legacy of braces on your legs for the rest of your life?
ROBERTS: Yes. The weakness in my hands will stay and the leg braces will stay.
WALLACE: So Judy Roberts and her husband have filed a claim against the U.S. government. They're asking $12 million, though they don't expect to get nearly that much. Judy, why did you take the flu shot?
ROBERTS: I'd never taken any other flu shots, but I felt like this was going to be a major epidemic, and the only way to prevent a major epidemic of a - a really deadly variety of flu was for every body to be immunized.
WALLACE: Where did this so called "deadly variety of flu", where did it first hit back in 1976? It began right here at Fort Dix in New Jersey in January of that year, when a number of recruits began to complain of respiratory ailments, something like the common cold. An Army doctor here sent samples of their throat cultures to the New Jersey Public Health Lab to find our just what kind of bug was going around here. One of those samples was from a Private David Lewis, who had left his sick bed to go on a forced march. Private Lewis had collapsed on that march, and his sergeant had revived him by mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. But the sergeant showed no signs of illness. A few days later, Private Lewis died.
ROBERTS: If this disease is so potentially fatal that it's going to kill a young, healthy man, a middle-aged schoolteacher doesn't have a prayer.
WALLACE: The New Jersey lab identified most of those solders' throat cultures as the normal kind of flu virus going around that year, but they could not make out what kind of virus was in the culture from the dead soldier, and from four others who were sick. So they sent those cultures to the Federal Center for Disease Control in Atlanta, Georgia, for further study. A few days later they got the verdict: swine flu. But that much-publicized outbreak of swine flu at Fort Dix involved only Private Lewis, who died, and those four other soldiers, who recovered completely without the swine flu shot.
ROBERTS: If I had known at that time that the boy had been in a sick bed, got up, went out on a forced march and then collapsed and died, I would never have taken the shot.
DR DAVID SENCER: The rationale for our recommendation was not on the basis of the death of a - a single individual, but it was on the basis that when we do see a change in the characteristics of the influenza virus, it is a massive public-health problem in the country.
WALLACE: Dr David Sencer, then head of the CDC - the Center of Disease Control in Atlanta - is now in private industry. He devised the swine flu program and he pushed it.
WALLACE: You began to give flu shots to the American people in October of '76?
DR SENCER: October 1st.
WALLACE: By that time, how many cases of swine flu around the world had been reported?
DR SENCER: There had been several reported, but none confirmed. There had been cases in Australia that were reported by the press, by the news media. There were cases in -
WALLACE: None confirmed? Did you ever uncover any other outbreaks of swine flu anywhere in the world?
DR SENCER: No
WALLACE: Now, nearly everyone was to receive a shot in a public health facility where a doctor might not be present, therefore it was up to the CDC to come up with some kind of official consent form giving the public all the information it needed about the swine flu shot. This form stated that the swine flu vaccine had been tested. What it didn't say was that after those tests were completed, the scientists developed another vaccine and that it was the one given to most of the 46 million who took the shot. That vaccine was called "X-53a". Was X-53a ever field tested?
DR SENCER: I-I can't say. I would have to -
WALLACE: It wasn't
DR SENCER: I don't know
WALLACE: Well, I would think that you're in charge of the program
DR SENCER: I would have to check the records. I haven't looked at this in some time.
WALLACE: The information form the consent form was also supposed to warn people about any risk of serious complications following the shot. But did it?
ROBERTS: No, I had never heard of any reactions other than a sore arm, fever, this sort of thing.
WALLACE: Judy Roberts' husband, Gene, also took the shot.
GENE ROBERTS: Yes, I looked at that document, I signed it. Nothing on there said I was going to have a heart attack, or I can get Guillain Barre, which I'd never heard of.
WALLACE: What if people from the government, from the Center for Disease Control, what if they had indeed, known about it, what would be your feeling?
JUDY ROBERTS: They should have told us.
WALLACE: Did anyone ever come to you and say, "You know something, fellows, there's the possibility of neurological damage if you get into a mass immunization program?"
DR SENCER: No
WALLACE: No one ever did?
DR SENCER: No
WALLACE: Do you know Michael Hattwick?
DR SENCER: Yes, uh-hmm.
WALLACE: Dr Michael Hattwick directed the surveillance team for the swine flu program at the CDC. His job was to find out what possible complications could arise from taking the shot and to report his findings to those in charge. Did you know ahead of time, Dr Hattwick that there had been case reports of neurological disorders, neurological illness, apparently associated with the injection of influenza vaccine?
DR MICHAEL HATTWICK: Absolutely
WALLACE: You did?
DR HATIWICK: Yes
WALLACE: How did you know that?
DR Hattwick: By review of the literature.
WALLACE: So you told your superiors - the men in charge of the swine flu immunization program - about the possibility of neurological disorders?
DR RATTWICK: Absolutely
WALLACE: What would you say if I told you that your superiors say that you never told them about the possibility of neurological complications?
DR HAJTWICK: That's nonsense. I can't believe that they would say that they did not know that there were neurological illnesses associated with influenza vaccination. That simply is not true. We did know that.
DR SENCER: I have said that Dr Hattwick had never told me of his feelings on this subject.
WALLACE: Then he's lying?
DR SENCER: I guess you would have to make that assumption.
WALLACE: Then why does this report from your own agency, dated July 1976, list neurological complications as a possibility?
DR SENCER: I think the consensus of the scientific community was that the evidence relating neurologic disorders to influenza immunization was such that they did not feel that this association was a real one.
WALLACE: You didn't feel it was necessary to tell the American people that information
DR SENCER: I think that over the - the years we have tried to inform the American people as - as fully as possible.
WALLACE: As part of informing Americans about the swine flu threat, Dr Sencer's CDC also helped create the advertising to get the public to take the shot. Let me read to your from one of your own agency's memos planning the campaign to urge Americans to take the shot. "The swine flu vaccine has been taken by many important persons," he wrote. "Example: President Ford, Henry Kissinger, Elton John, Muhammad Ah, Mary Tyler Moore, Rudolf Nureyev, Walter Cronkite, Ralph Nader, Edward Kennedy" -etcetera, etcetera, True?
DR SENCER: I'm not familiar with that particular piece of paper, but I do know that, at least of that group, President Ford did take the vaccination.
WALLACE: Did you talk to these people beforehand to find out if they planned to take the shot?
DR SENCER: I did not, no.
WALLACE: Did anybody?
DR SENC ER: I do not know.
WALLACE: Did you get permission to use their names in your campaign?
DR SENCER: I do not know.
WALLACE: Mary, did you take a swine flu shot?
MARY TYLER MOORE: No, I did not.
WALLACE: Did you give them permission to use your name saying that you had or were going to?
MOORE: Absolutely not. Never did.
WALLACE: Did you ask your own doctor about taking the swine flu shot?
MOORE: Yes, and at the time he thought it might be a good idea. But I resisted it, because I was leery of having the symptoms that sometimes go with that kind of inoculation.
WALLACE: So you didn't?
MOORE: No, I didn't.
WALLACE: Have you spoken to your doctor since?
MOORE: Yes.
WALLACE: And?
MOORE: He's delighted that I didn't take that shot.
WALLACE: You're in charge. Somebody's in charge.
DR SENCER: There are -
WALLACE: This is your advertising strategy that I have a copy of here.
DR SENCER: Who's it signed by?
WALLACE: This one is unsigned. But you--you'll acknowledge that it was your baby so to speak?
DR SENCER: It could have been from the Department of Health, Education and Welfare. It could be from CDC. I don't know. I'll be happy to take responsibility for it.
WALLACE: It's been three years now since you fell ill by GBS right?
ROBERTS: Right.
WALLACE: Has the federal government, in your estimation, played fair with you about your claim?
ROBERTS: No, I don't think so. It seems to be dragging on and on and on, and really no end in sight that I can see at this point.
JOSEPH CALIFANO: With respect to the cases of Guillain Barre...
WALLACE: Former Secretary of HEW Joseph Caifano, too was disturbed that there was no end in sight. So a year and a half ago, he proposed that Uncle Sam would cut the bureaucratic red tape for victims suffering from GBS and would pay up quickly.
CALIFANO: We shouldn't hold them to an impossible or too difficult standard of proving that they were hurt. Even if we pay a few people a few thousand dollars that might not have deserved it, I think justice requires that we promptly pay those people who do deserve it.
WALLACE: Who's making the decision to be so hard-nosed about settling?
CALIFANO: Well, I assume the Justice Department is.
WALLACE: Griffin Bell, before he left?
CALIFANO: Well, the Justice Department agreed to the statement I made. It was cleared word for word with the lawyers in the Justice Department by my HEW lawyers.
CALIFANO: That-that statement said that we should pay Guillain Barre claims without regard to whether the federal government was negligent, if they - if they resulted from the swine flu shot.
GENE ROBERTS: I think the government knows its wrong.
JUDY ROBERTS: If it drags out long enough, that people will just give up, let it go.
GENE ROBERTS: I—I am a little more adamant in my thoughts than my wife is, because I asked - told Judy to take the shot. She wasn't going to take it, and she never had had shots. And I'm mad with my government because they knew the fact, but they didn't realize those facts because they - if they had released them, the people wouldn't have taken it. And they can come out tomorrow and tell me there's going to be an epidemic, and they can drop off like flies to - next to me, I will not take another shot that my government tells me to take.
WALLACE: Meantime, Judy Roberts and some 4,000 others like her are still waiting for their day in court.
[1] David M. Morens, Jeffery K. Taubenberger, and Anthony S. Fauci, “Rethinking next-generation vaccines for coronaviruses, influenza viruses, and other respiratory viruses,” Cell Host Microbe, January 11, 2023, pp. 146–157.
Thanks for this. No matter how many people I tell about this (it was a test and apparently, we failed), they just give me the blank stare. AIDS is similar. They are causing the plandemics then force poisoning us - getting us to beg for the poisons - as solution.
Hitler had nothing on these people!
I was 21, had the swine flu shot, and fainted in public the next day as my fever rose to 102. Doctor asked why I had taken the shot. My naive reply, the president of the US said we should.