Rolf Marschalek was on vacation when he saw a new paper had been published in the journal Autoimmunity. Marschalek, a biochemist at Goethe University Frankfurt in Germany, was “very upset,” because he’d peer-reviewed the manuscript and had recommended against publication. The article appeared online September 6, 2025 and within weeks the publisher began an investigation into concerns about its content.

In Marschalek’s initial review detailed how Qubit fluorometry, one of the methods the authors used to measure the amount of DNA in the vaccine vials, was “not suited” for use when samples contain much higher amounts of RNA than DNA, as is the case with mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccines. He also singled out Figure 2 in the paper, which depicts the amount of DNA in a vaccine lot alongside the number of adverse events reported for each lot. The figure “clearly tells the reader that there is no correlation” between side effects and DNA content, Marschalek wrote in the review.

The authors submitted a revision, which Marschalek reviewed in July. “They didn’t change all the things I recommended,” he told, and he wasn’t satisfied with the revisions. “Thus, the revised version of the authors have strengthened my opinion that the whole paper is ‘a mission’ for the ‘anti-vaxx community’ and not a scientific paper,” he wrote in his review of the revision. He again recommended against publication.

He complained to the editor of Autoimmunity, who told him he could submit a letter to the editor, he said. He did so, but it was not published, because the journal does not publish letters to the editor, a representative of Taylor & Francis, which publishes the journal, told him. However, the publisher began an investigation of the article soon after.

Source https://retractionwatch.com/2025/11/21/exclusive-reviewer-recommended-against-publishing-paper-on-dna-in-covid-vaccines/

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