Vaccine safety has become a hot, and often controversial, topic in the United States long before COVID-19 hit. Between anecdotal stories, clinical trials, and peer-reviewed papers, it can be difficult for anyone to make a sound, informed decision about what we choose to put in our bodies. Is it safe? Is it effective?
To help answer these important questions, the CDC developed a system called “V-Safe” during the COVID-19 public health emergency. V-Safe is a vaccine adverse event reporting cell phone app whereby users voluntarily record their post-vaccine symptoms from their phone. Over 10 million people utilized V-Safe, which accumulated more than 140 million rows total. The data, which is nearly 27 GB, is too large for most people to download, much less open in Excel to analyze. It also requires multiple joins to other tables for the data to be usable. Therefore we sliced the data into usable chunks, by state, and linked the response data with registrant data and vaccination dates.
Our hope is that this data can be leveraged by researchers and departments of health to make vaccines as safe as possible. The cost of the data covers maintenance of the website and the labor involved in performing extraction, transformation, and loading (ETL) of the data.
Download Free COVID-19 VSafe Sample Data & Data Dictionary (500 rows):
Data Elements included in COVID-19 VSafe data are:
| Column Name | Data Sorted by | Description | Numeric or Character |
|---|---|---|---|
| abdominal_pain | symptom: mild, moderate, severe | text | |
| chills | symptom: mild, moderate, severe | text | |
| coadministered | was another vaccine co-administered? Yes/no | text | |
| coadministered_vax | which vaccine was co-administered? (for example, flu) | text | |
| days_after | 3 | # days after that event started | numeric |
| diarrhea | symptom: mild, moderate, severe | text | |
| dose_num | 2 | dose number | numeric |
| duration_mins | duration of the symptom in minutes | text | |
| fatigue | symptom: mild, moderate, severe | text | |
| feeling_today | how is respondent feeling today | text | |
| fever | fever: yes or no | text | |
| guardian_registrant_code | guardian registrant code if guardian of a minor | text | |
| had_symptoms | had symptoms: yes or no | text | |
| headache | symptom: mild, moderate, severe | text | |
| health_impact | combination of choices: unable to work, unable to attend school, unable to perform activities of daily living, get care from a medical professional | text | |
| health_now | health now is poor, fair, or good | text | |
| health_now_comparison | health now in comparison to (?): poor, fair, or good | text | |
| healthcare_visits | combination of choices: emergency room, hospitalization, outpatient clinic or urgent care, telehealth visit, | text | |
| hospital | went to emergency room or hospital (does not include urgent care) | text | |
| itching | symptom: mild, moderate, severe | text | |
| joint_pains | symptom: mild, moderate, severe | text | |
| manufacturer | manufacturer | text | |
| muscle_or_body_aches | symptom: mild, moderate, severe | text | |
| nausea | symptom: mild, moderate, severe | text | |
| num_severe_symptoms | # of severe symptoms, out of 14 possible | numeric | |
| pain | symptom: mild, moderate, severe | text | |
| preferred_language | preferred language | text | |
| pregnancy_test | yes/no | text | |
| pregnant | yes/no | text | |
| rash_outside_injection_site | symptom: mild, moderate, severe | text | |
| redness | symptom: mild, moderate, severe | text | |
| registered_date | date registered | date | |
| registrant_code | 1 | unique registrant (survey respondent) code | text |
| relationship | relationship, if guardian of a minor | text | |
| seek_medical_care | sought medical help of any kind | text | |
| sex | gender | text | |
| site_reaction | combination of choices: pain, itching, redness, and swelling | text | |
| started_on | date symptom started on | text | |
| started_on_time | time symptom started | text | |
| statecode | state abbreviation | text | |
| survey_static_id | survey id which captures dose number and days after vaccination | text | |
| swelling | symptom: mild, moderate, severe | text | |
| systemic_reaction | combination of several symptoms such as: chills, pain, fatigue, nausea, abdominal pain, diarrhea, rash outside injection site, vomiting | text | |
| temp_cel | temperature in celsius (number) | numeric | |
| temp_far | temperature in farenheit (number) | numeric | |
| temperature_celsius | temperature celsius (character) | text | |
| temperature_farenheit | temperature farenheit (character) | text | |
| temperature_reading | did you take your temperature? Yes/no | text | |
| tested_positive | tested positive for COVID-19: yes or no | text | |
| tested_positive_date | date tested positive for COVID-19 | text | |
| unable_to_flag | unable to work or attend school or perform activites of daily living | text | |
| vaccination_date | vaccination date for the line that the data is on (particular registrant, dose, and days after) | text | |
| vaccine_caused_health_issues | do you think vaccine caused your health issues: yes or no | text | |
| vaxxdate_dose1 | vaccine dose 1 date | date | |
| vaxxdate_dose2 | vaccine dose 2 date | date | |
| vaxxdate_dose3 | vaccine dose 3 date | date | |
| vaxxdate_dose4 | vaccine dose 4 date | date | |
| vaxxdate_dose5 | vaccine dose 5 date | date | |
| vomiting | symptom: mild, moderate, severe | text | |
| zip_code | first 3 digits of zip code, which is enough to identify a state | numeric |