Here’s Why ‘Thanks Pfizer’ Is Trending on Social Media

If the words “Thanks Pfizer” were intended to stir up more anti-vaccine sentiment, social media users have shaken things up by dominating the conversation with hilarious memes instead.

It’s hard to tell where “Thanks Pfizer” started exactly, but many point to a May 2022 tweet by a user named @AngeliaDesselle that was recently resurfaced and subsequently took off — but perhaps not in the way it was intended.

Desselle tweeted a video of her legs shaking severely, along with the words “Thanks Pfizer,” ostensibly with the intention of blaming the company’s COVID-19 mRNA vaccine for the side effect.

Yet many questioned whether the shaking was involuntary or deliberate, asking why the camera wasn’t also shaking. Another Twitter user even slapped a “context” label on the tweet. It noted that “spasming has not been a proven side effect of the vaccine, and this account frequently posts misinformation.”

Rather than get riled up, social media users, mostly on Twitter and TikTok, lightened up the situation. They posted videos of dancing and quaking and expressed their thanks to the pharmaceutical company, sending “Thanks Pfizer” into trending territory earlier this week.

One meme shows youth groups and church dancers, stating, “These people were FORCED to get the Pfizer.” Another shows a church group overcome with emotion that gets “blamed” on the company.

There were scenes from classic movies like “Grease” and “Dirty Dancing” that made the cut, and of course Elaine’s dancing from the TV show “Seinfeld” made an appearance. Pets were a part of it too — both cats and dogs — as were iPhones.

Not even a former president was immune, with Trump’s dancing at a rally getting caught up in the meme.

It was perhaps an unexpected turn, at least for Twitter, where worries about new approaches to handling medical misinformation have abounded since Elon Musk bought the company.

One account claimed the memes mocked the vaccine-injured, but it was hard to find any videos showing clear evidence of side effects. Indeed, some users pointed out that those who are truly harmed should be seeking out healthcare and reporting anything suspicious to the relevant authorities. That’s how rare-but-real side effects including blood clots with Johnson & Johnson and Janssen’s COVID-19 vaccine and myocarditis with the mRNA vaccines came to light.

Federal regulators tasked with oversight of vaccines continue to surveil them for side effects. The most recent evidence of this was an announcement from CDC and FDA earlier this month that they detected a signal of stroke risk with the Pfizer mRNA vaccine in one database, which wasn’t seen in any of its other surveillance systems. While the agencies were not concerned about this questionable signal, they shared their findings in an attempt to keep open the channels of public dialogue.