Fired FDA Official Dr. Tracy Beth Høeg Exposes What’s Hidden Behind Closed Doors

 by Paul D. Thacker

I have a new podcast with Danish American physician and epidemiologist Dr. Tracy Beth Høeg on her COVID research and the cancelling she received from the University of California and NPR, followed by her brief FDA tenure, and firing in May. Here’s a brief look at our discussion, which you can find below at The DisInformation Chronicle Podcast.

Firing from FDA

Høeg was appointed to lead the FDA’s center for drug approval in late 2025 under Commissioner Marty Makary. But in May she came to work and read media reports of her “resignation” that she knew nothing about. After FDA lawyers then asked her to resign, she refused and was locked out of systems and then walked out of the agency that night.

She received no performance-based explanation and the purported author of her termination memo later denied writing or seeing it. The order for her firing came from “way above their pay grade” agency lawyers told her.

“The deep state really is a thing,” she says.

COVID research and why she became a critic

When COVID hit, Høeg was living in California but following COVID policies in Denmark where she previously lived. Denmark, Norway, and Sweden reopened schools early, did not mask children or teachers, and did not see large school-linked case spikes. She helped her Sacramento diocese reopen in Aug 2020 by using Danish-style protocols and classifying schools as daycares to evade Governor Newsom’s school-closure rules.

Høeg published 30–40 papers on a host of different topics including COVID transmission, masks, vaccine risk-benefit, pregnancy safety, long COVID methodology, visitor restrictions, and testing. Two well-known studies:

• Kids in Wood County, Wisconsin showed little transmission of the virus in school which was consistent with European data. While Høeg expected the results to speed U.S. school reopening, the conclusions were ignored.

• An analysis of myocarditis in boys found an unfavorable risk-benefit after the second Pfizer vaccine dose. Top U.S. journals were internally divided ver publishing the study but the results were later corroborated.

Professional and media blowback

At UC Davis, Høeg faced complaints from Nature Magazine and communications staff asked her to not use her university affiliation. NPR dropped her interview from an episode after she said outdoor sports masking of children lacked evidence and was inappropriate. UC Davis then refused to renew her position after she published a study on myocarditis in boys who had been vaccinated.

FDA work: SSRIs, vaccine deaths, Tavneos

In 2025 she helped organize an FDA panel on SSRI risks in pregnancy, leading the American Psychiatric Association to complain in a letter that the panel “unbalanced.” Much of the discussion considered warnings already in the FDA label, and Høeg noted that safety studies are largely left to manufacturers.

Shortly after Høeg arrived at the FDA, she found that staff had discovered pediatric deaths from the COVID vaccines. Dr. Vinay Prasad’s leaked memo cited that staff work. However, legacy media and former FDA commissioners framed the FDA reports as Prasad (or Høeg) inventing findings. Senator Ron Johnson released internal FDA emails that confirmed career staff authored the 10-death assessment.

Dr. Høeg still wonders why the Biden administration never released the reports concerning pediatric deaths from COVID vaccines.

As acting CDER director Høeg sent a letter about Tavneos which found the pivotal trial for FDA approval of this drug was corrupt. The New England of Medicine later retracted the paper and Europeans withdrew authorization. Mainstream coverage of this scandal was minimal and the drug is still marketed in the United States.

Broader takeaway

Høeg argues public-health agencies and journals adopted an agenda (masks work, vaccines are “science,” school closures were necessary) and then defended it with weak or selected evidence. She is not optimistic that institutions will self-correct unless communities refuse any future rounds of unproven, high-cost interventions for children.

Data transparency and removal of politics from medicine remain essential.

https://disinformationchronicle.substack.com/p/fired-fda-official-dr-tracy-beth