Consider this scenario: You received the first shot of the Covid-19 vaccine, after ten minutes you have difficulty breathing, you're flushed, have a rash and you have an elevated heart rate. This was the experience of a health care worker who in 2020, received her first shot of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine at a hospital in Alaska. Fortunately she was treated quickly and has recovered.
But consider this -- what if she hadn't recovered? What if she had gone into anaphalactic shock and her situation had gone down hill? What if she could have been seriously hurt? Maybe paralysis from taking the Pfizer vaccine. What then?
You would say, "Surely there would be a thorough investigation of her case as to what had happened and why. Right?" Yes. Everything would be viewed as data. A report was made at the hospital about her symptoms. But what about her? If something had gone terribly wrong, would she and her family be thoroughly compensated? Um...well, no.
No Compensation
In February 2020, the US federal government invoked the Public Readiness and Emergency Preparedness Act. The law passed in 2005, empowers the Health and Human Services Secretary (whomever is in that role) to provide legal protection to pharmaceutical companies and their distributors of medical supplies such as vaccines and other medication if something wrong were to happen to someone being treated by their drug. The HHS can defend that entity once it is not found by the courts that the company had committed "wilful misconduct". The law will be in effect until 2024. This means for the next two (2) years the companies "cannot be sued for money damages in court" over injuries, even though there may be proof that the administration of the Covid vaccine to the patient was the reason he or she became seriously ill.
According to Rogge Dunn, a Dallas labour and employment attorney, under this new dispensation, an American citizen cannot sue the US Food and Drug Administration for authorizing a vaccine for emergency use, nor can you hold your employer responsible for damages if they mandate inoculation as a condition for employment.
According to the Minnesota Department of Health's website, the PREP Act "...declaration provides immunity from tort liability claims (except willful misconduct) to individuals or organizations involved in the manufacture, distribution, or dispensing of medical countermeasures."
The website goes on to explain what immunity from tort liability means.
"... there is no legal tort claim that can be pursued in state or federal courts. Tort claims include all claims (except for willful misconduct), under federal or state law for any type of loss including death; physical, mental, or emotional injury; fear of such injury; or property damage or loss, including business interruption loss, with any causal relationship to any stage of development, distribution, administration, dispensing, or sue of the covered countermeasure recommended in the PREP Act declaration."
Now we realise that this statement may be unclear to you, so let's give you some background information on the word tort.
Meaning of the word tort?
Tort comes from the Latin word tortum which means 'wrong'. When someone has done a wrong to you, there must be a way which you can seek and receive justice. Tort laws therefore provide the means for one to recover losses/ seek restitution for any thing done against them which inflicted harm, loss or damage personally or to property.
Hence, a tort is a civil wrong that causes a claimant to suffer loss or harm, resulting in legal liability for the person who committed the tortious act. It can include intentional infliction of emotional distress, negligence, financial losses, injuries, invasion of privacy, and many other things.
Essentially then, the PREP Act removes this protection from the ordinary, unsuspecting citizen who may possibly suffer an adverse effect from a vaccine, both now and/or in the future, and possibly within the next four years.
Attorney-at-law Rogge Dunn also revealed that even though the U.S. Congress had allocated funds to subsidize wage losses and medical expenses in lieu of cost incurred from "irreparable harm" due to vaccination, less than 6% (29) of compensation claims has ever been paid out in the past ten (10) years. Why? Because it is very difficult to prove direct harm (side effects were caused) by a new vaccine.
Warp Speed?
Interestingly, Dunn believes the reason for the granting of immunity was the demand placed on the pharmaceutical companies to come up with a new vaccine in a short time.
"When the government said, 'We want you to develop this four or five times faster than you normally do,' most likely the manufacturers said to the government, 'We want you, the government, to protect us from multimillion-dollar lawsuits."
"It is very rare for a blanket immunity law to be passed. ... Pharmaceutical companies typically aren't offered much liability protection under the law," he said.
The quickest vaccine ever created was for mumps and that took four (4) years to develop, and was licensed in 1967. Pfizer's Covid-19 vaccine on the other hand was developed and cleared for emergency use in just eight (8) months, which is the reason for widespread mistrust and skepticism both in the US and around the world.
Recent events would have caused jittery nerves, when in early 2021, two health care workers in Alaska suffered allergic reactions, one seriously. Persons would have also taken note of the publicized cases of allergic reaction that occurred in the United Kingdom, which also involved the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. Since then, other persons have come forward claiming to have suffered injury from this vaccine and others. Symptoms such as fever, tiredness, chills, shortness of breath, racing heart rate, and also more severe cases such as stroke and seizures.
On Tuesday, December 15, 2020, the FDA issued a report stating that Pfizer and Moderna’s vaccination guidelines must include “Bell’s palsy” (face paralysis) as a possible side effect. However, because the vaccine was recently approved, and no persons were included in the trial stage of the vaccines who were prone to allergic reaction to vaccines and other medication, there is not enough data to prove that this side effect is as a result of these new vaccines. It is therefore expected that the American medical frontline workers, will make careful observation and report outcomes.
Why would the government allow this?
A last word from expert lawyer Rogge Dunn:
"The government doesn't want people suing the companies making the Covid vaccine. Because then, the manufacturers would probably charge the government a higher price per person per dose."
So therefore, there is no redress for someone who takes the vaccine and becomes terribly ill.
Vaccines Paused
In March 2021, several countries paused the administering of the Johnson and Johnson and AstraZeneca vaccines because of harmful blood clots that were causing strokes and even tragically caused death. Some medical experts believed that there could be a possible link between the vaccines and these rare clots so an investigation was launched into the cases.
The European Medicines Agency in its findings stated there is not enough evidence to prove an increased risk of persons suffering from blood clots after taking the vaccines, however they noted that rare clotting incidents with low blood platelets were possible. In its report on AstraZeneca, it states, "the vaccine is not associated with an increase in the overall risk of blood clots (thromboembolic events) in those who receive it... however, the vaccine may be associated with very rare cases of blood clots associated with thrombocytopenia, i.e. low levels of blood platelets (elements in the blood that help it to clot) with or without bleeding, including rare cases of clots in the vessels draining blood from the brain (CVST)."*
The EMA and the WHO both agreed that the benefits of these vaccines far outweigh any risk they may pose, since the adverse cases were small in number compared to the millions who had already received their jab and seemed fine. Therefore, while research is still ongoing, persons will be and have been inoculated with these jabs.
Conclusion
It remains to be seen what the long term adverse effects of these vaccines will be, and scientists themselves admit that they do not know what could be the long term harmful outcomes, if any.** They believe however, that the vaccines are the hope to, if not fully eliminating the virus, at least preventing severe disease and death from COVID-19.
Talk back:
Will you take the Covid-19 vaccine? Have you already taken it?
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CNBC Health and Science: https://www.cnbc.com/2020/12/16/covid-vaccine-side-effects-compensation-lawsuit.html
Minnesota Department of Health: 'The Public Readiness and Preparedness Act (PREP): What you need to know.' https://www.health.state.mn.us/communities/ep/legal/prepact.html
Wikipedia. 'Tort.' https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tort
Vocabulary.com. 'Tort.' https://www.vocabulary.com/dictionary/tort
*European Medicines Agency. 'COVID-19 Vaccine AstraZeneca: benefits still outweigh the risks despite possible link to rare blood clots with low blood platelets.' Official EMA website. https://www.ema.europa.eu/en/news/covid-19-vaccine-astrazeneca-benefits-still-outweigh-risks-despite-possible-link-rare-blood-clots
**Seladi-Schulman, Jill, Ph.D. 'How safe is the COVID-19 vaccine?' Healthline. https://www.healthline.com/health/is-the-coronavirus-vaccine-safe
Updated November 25, 2022
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