Tuesday, December 22, 2009

Doctor to sue DOH over vaccinated son’s death/Taipei Times

Does Taiwan allow law suits against the government for possible swine flu-related deaths? US law does not. Nor can you sue the manufacturer. Instead, you must apply to DHHS and only if a medical officer employed by DHHS says the vaccine caused the death can you be compensated by DHHS. About $300,000 is the maximal award for a death, with no compensation allowed to pay attorneys or experts.

This report points up the difficulty linking an injury to a vaccine. Taiwan's CDC Director-General said, "There is also no evidence at present to link the boy’s death to the vaccine.” Apparently all reported deaths were determined by the Department of Health to be unrelated to the vaccine, even though the doctor's son appeared to die from an autoimmune reaction:
After preliminary discussions, the experts concluded that the boy’s death
was unrelated to the vaccination, Kuo said, adding that an immune system problem was a possible cause of death.“The boy’s parents are welcome to request an investigation into the case to allow experts to make a more comprehensive, independent judgment,” Kuo said.

Problems and side effects that have been reported so far from the vaccine
include deaths among elderly recipients and dizziness among
students. These have dissuaded some from getting vaccinated.Health officials
said the reports of dizziness caused some parents, to withdraw their permission
for their children to receive the shots.“A total of 331 cases of side effects
from the vaccines has been reported, but all the symptoms were
temporary
,” Kuo said. “These cases will not affect our vaccination
policy.”

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