Outgoing HHS Secretary Makes It Harder to Get Paid for Vaccine Injuries
January 29, 2021 — On the day before he resigned, Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Alex Azar signed a new rule that will try to make it harder get paid for vaccine-related shoulder injuries and COVID vaccine injuries in children.
Shoulder Injuries Related to Vaccine Administration (SIRVA) are the most common type of vaccine injury, representing more than 60% of all new cases filed in the last year. Most involve flu shot injuries.
SIRVA is an excruciatingly painful shoulder injury that occurs when the vaccine needle is injected too high or too deep, puncturing the bursa.
Court records show SIRVA payouts ranging from $50,000 to $123,000, resulting in $119 million paid from 2016 through 2019. The payouts are funded by a $0.75 tax on the sale of every vaccine.
Also, just in time for millions of people to get COVID vaccines, Azar also changed the rules to stop new vaccines from automatically becoming part of the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program (VICP).
Currently, COVID vaccine claims are redirected to the little-used Countermeasures Injury Compensation Program (CICP), which has been called a “Black Hole” court system because it rarely pays compensation, and when it does, it pays far less than the VICP.
The new rule changes will have a major impact on children who are inevitable injured or killed by severe side effects of the COVID vaccine, such as anaphylaxis.
Before the changes, COVID vaccine injuries in children would have gone through the VICP once they were recommended for regular use in children.
The HHS proposal was initially supposed to take effect in 30 days, but the Biden administration said it plans to take more time to review the changes before they are actually implemented.
Source: A Day Before Resigning, HHS Secretary Makes it Harder for Vaccine Injuries to Get Compensation
