Caregivers Protected Against Smallpox Lawsuits
Bush Plan Would Not Compensate Patients for
Vaccine's Side Effects or Accidental Exposure to Virus
_____ Biotech Headlines_____
•
Walking Sticks, Just Winging It (The Washington Post,
Jan 16, 2003) •
Old Laws, New Fish (The Washington Post, Jan 15,
2003) •
Independence Federal Tries to Bolster Stock (The
Washington Post, Jan 13, 2003) •
Earning Their Stripes (The Washington Post, Jan 12,
2003)
By Ceci Connolly
Hospitals and health care workers who administer or take smallpox vaccine
in the program scheduled to begin later this month will not be held liable
for adverse consequences to others, federal health officials said yesterday.
But the Bush administration has rejected appeals to create a compensation
fund for patients who suffer complications from the vaccine's well-known
side effects.
The liability update was welcomed by hospitals and physician groups, who
have lobbied for broad legal protections for the 500,000 medical workers who
will serve as a sort of domestic front line against biological attack. The
new interpretation, to be formally released by the Department of Justice
later this week, means that neither hospitals nor their employees can be
sued if someone is injured by the smallpox vaccine.
But experts advising Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy G.
Thompson and some administration officials acknowledged lingering concerns
over the likelihood that a small number of people will experience severe
reactions and have no recourse.
"This could deter some people from being vaccinated," said D.A.
Henderson, a top HHS adviser and chairman of the Secretary's Council on
Public Health Preparedness.
Last month President Bush announced plans to resume a national smallpox
inoculation program, after a 30-year pause, because of increased fears the
deadly virus could be used as a weapon. The live vaccine is the only
protection or treatment available, and it is not without risks.
For every 1 million people vaccinated, between 15 and 42 will experience
severe reactions such as swelling of the brain or blindness, and one or two
will die, according to historical data. Many others will miss work because
of fever, rash or other flu-like symptoms.
In most states, workers' compensation protection will cover treatment of
the adverse effects, said Michael Osterholm, a council member and director
of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University
of Minnesota. But in states where workers' compensation does not apply,
people injured by the vaccine would have to sue the federal government and
prove negligence.
Public health experts have pressed the Bush administration to set up a
compensation program modeled after the well-respected Vaccine Injury
Compensation Fund, which pays set amounts of money to people injured by
routine childhood immunizations.
Henderson said the "potentially very large" cost of compensating people
injured by the smallpox vaccine has been a major stumbling block in
developing a new smallpox compensation fund.
However, Colleen Conway-Welch, dean of the Vanderbilt University School
of Nursing, said the lack of compensation complicates plans to recruit
nursing students for smallpox response teams.
The decision by Bush administration lawyers appears to be a double-whammy
for hospital patients inadvertently exposed to the vaccine through contact
with a vaccinated individual, said Margaret Hamburg, vice president for
biological programs at the Nuclear Threat Initiative. There is no set
compensation for them, she said, and "no right to sue for compensation.
That's a real problem."
© 2003 The Washington Post Company
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