NEW HAVEN, Conn. (WTNH) — In early January concern was raised over a possible connection between people over 65 who received the Pfizer COVID bivalent booster and had strokes.

This week FDA officials said they did not detect a link between the Pfizer COVID bivalent booster and strokes in two safety monitoring databases but are still investigating any potential stroke risks.

Yale Medicine Infectious Diseases Specialist, Dr. Scott Roberts, discussed the newly released data with News 8.

“I want to reassure you that this is probably not a real association since several other large databases that monitor vaccine safety did not see any signals related to this,” Dr. Roberts said.

He said it’s very unlikely to represent a true increase in risk.

“I think its a good sign that the CDC and the FDA are monitoring this safety data very closely and I imagine we will find much more about this soon,” Roberts said.

Medical experts are constantly learning more about what a covid infection does to different parts of the body. Data shows COVID can lead to clotting and some heart inflammation for some patients.

Heart-related deaths were on the decline before the onset of the coronavirus in late 2019. During 2020, the first year of COVID, deaths related to heart complications increased.

“Many people who have or are at risk for heart disease deferred care due to  COVID and I think a large part of this is we’re still catching up,” Roberts said.

New research is revealing that COVID can lead to high cholesterol. Two studies recently found both triglycerides and LDL cholesterol were higher, while HDL was lower in people who got COVID compared to those who did not.