Did a “Common Cold” Cause Reporter’s Heart Inflammation?

by Sharon Rondeau

(Jan. 31, 2023) — On January 28, MSNBC weekend anchor Yasmin Vossoughian addressed her absence from the station for the last month, claiming that newly-diagnosed conditions of myocarditis and pericarditis emanated from a “literal common cold,” a contention supported on-air by her cardiologist, Dr. Greg Katz.

Reportedly born in 1978 in New York City, Vossoughian previously worked at CNN affiliate HLN. January 28 was her first day back at MSNBC, she tweeted prior to going on-air.

Between January 2 and 28, she made no entries on her Twitter timeline.

On December 30, Vossoughian said, after experiencing chest and left-shoulder pain, she visited an urgent-care center and was told she had (acid) reflux disease, a diagnosis she did not find credible. A regular runner, non-smoker, vegetarian and observer of good health habits, she said, as the pain continued, her husband took her to the emergency room.

“The next day on December 30th [sic], Vassoughian continued, “I woke up with severe pains…it was like a tightening in my chest when I took deep breaths…I knew enough that it could mean — ‘could’ is the key word here, that I was having a heart attack…”

She described January as a “nightmare” in which she was diagnosed with pericarditis, “inflammation of the lining of my heart, brought on by — a virus, a literal common cold. I also had fluid around my heart that had to be drained or else it could hinder the beating of my heart…”

Following that procedure, she said, she was discharged on January 4 feeling well. “But that was not the end,” she continued. }Three days later I was readmitted when I felt a flutter in my heart” and diagnosed with “myocarditis, an actual inflammation of the heart muscle.”

The Mayo Clinic defines myocarditis as “inflammation of the heart muscle (myocardium). The inflammation can reduce the heart’s ability to pump blood. Myocarditis can cause chest pain, shortness of breath, and rapid or irregular heart rhythms (arrhythmias).”

“I remember being shepherded through the emergency room and wondering, ‘Is this it?'” Vossoughian continued her story. “It wasn’t, thank God…”

More tests followed, she said, to determine that “nothing else was fueling what was happening, and in fact, in the end, it was still just the cold that was doing all of this, that it caused all of this inflammation in and around my heart.”

The CDC reports it has received “rare” reports of myocarditis and pericarditis following COVID-19 vaccination.

“Myocarditis and pericarditis have rarely been reported,” the CDC states. “When reported, the cases have especially been in adolescents and young adult males within several days after mRNA COVID-19 vaccination (Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna).

• More often after the second dose
• Usually within a week of vaccination
• Most patients with myocarditis or pericarditis who received care responded well to medicine and rest and felt better quickly.
• Patients can usually return to their normal daily activities after their symptoms improve.
• Those who have been diagnosed with myocarditis should consult with their cardiologist (heart doctor) about return to exercise or sports.”

The National Institutes of Health’s National Library of Medicine contains a number of papers on a possible causal relationship between COVID-19 vaccines and myocarditis/pericarditis.

According to the Washington State Department of Health in 2021, there is a “probable link” between myocarditis and “some COVID-19 vaccines,” citing the CDC.

A “talking point for clinicians,” however, reads, “The risk of myocarditis is low, especially compared to the strong benefits of vaccination.”

“Cases have mostly occurred in adolescents and young adults under the age of 30 years, and mostly in males,” the advisory states.

She will be taking medication “for some time to come,” Vossoughian said, and “is getting older; I need to admit that.”

While introducing Katz, Vossoughian observed that, “supposedly this happens, and it seems to be happenin’ a lot these days.”

“How does a cold go to your heart?” she asked Katz, who attributed Yassoughian’s complications as “not so much the cold itself that’s going to your heart; it’s the way your body’s responding to the cold.”

In most cases, Katz said, people recover from a cold after experiencing a runny nose and other typical symptoms. “But for a small proportion of people,” he continued, “they get an overactive immune response, and they can have inflammation in lots of different areas, and inflammation of the sac around the heart, pericarditis like you first were dealing with, is an unfortunate thing that we see sometimes. We’ve been seeing it a little more this year than other years, but it’s not unheard of.”

Her body’s response to the virus, Katz said, was “rare, but not the rarest.”

Some contend Vossoughian was “fully vaccinated.” On his Twitter timeline Tuesday, cardiologist Dr. Peter A. McCullough responded to Vossoughian’s broadcast with, “Myopericarditis is a common complication of C19 vaccination. Should be attributed to the vaccine not ‘a common cold’ since the FDA has specific warnings this will happen. Failure to mention C19 vaccine is public health concern.”

According to healthline.com, “Myopericarditis is a term that describes two distinct heart conditions that occur simultaneously, and are usually the result of a viral infection. One condition involves the pericardium, the thin, but protective sac-like membrane surrounding your heart. The other affects the myocardium, the thickest inner layer of your heart muscle itself.”

On his Substack, McCullough has written at length on myopericarditis and its two components, claiming myocarditis has taken a “heavy toll in teenagers.”

In a little-reported declaration dated June 25, 2021, McCullough noted the CDC wrote:

Today, the FDA is announcing revisions to the patient and provider fact sheets for the Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccines regarding suggested increased risks of myocarditis (inflammation of the heart muscle) and pericarditis (inflammation of the tissue surrounding the heart) following vaccination. For each vaccine, the Fact Sheet for Healthcare Providers Administering Vaccine (Vaccination Providers) has been revised to include a warning about myocarditis and pericarditis and the Fact Sheet for Recipients and Caregivers has been revised to include information about myocarditis and pericarditis. This update follows an extensive review of information and the discussion by CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices meeting on Wednesday. The data presented at this meeting reinforced the FDA’s decision to revise the fact sheets and further informed the specific revisions…

In an interview earlier this month with The Epoch Times and UK cardiologist Dr. Aheem Malhotra, McCullough quoted from two studies of the rate of myocarditis in the general population and after two or three mRNA COVID injections. In Finland, McCullough said, as the video showed screenshots of the referenced studies, researchers found the before-COVID rate to be “4 cases per million.”

Between the Finnish study and several others, including the CDC’s, McCullough said, the myocarditis rate increased. “Now the two prospective cohort studies…they find, together, that point to estimate now: 25,000 cases per million.”

While myocarditis can result from a COVID-19 infection, McCullough said in another interview, it is “mild” and “very different from the myocarditis that we’re seeing with the vaccines.”

“I don’t want anybody to think that the myocarditis of the natural infection is anything like what we’re seeing with the vaccines,” McCullough said, emphasizing that “in children, it is way more serious and more prominent than a post-COVID myocarditis.”