Civic groups Taiwan Women’s Link and Taiwan Association for Human Rights yesterday criticized the Ministry of Health and Welfare for amending regulations on vaccine injury compensation in February, saying that it significantly passes on the risk of adverse reactions to vaccine recipients.
The ministry on Feb. 18 promulgated amendments to the Regulations Governing Collection and Review of Vaccine Injury Compensation Fund (預防接種受害救濟基金徵收及審議辦法).
Among the amended articles is Article 13, which defines how the vaccine injury compensation working group assesses and classifies the causal relationship between vaccination and an alleged injury.
Photo: CNA
The relationship is classified into three categories — “unassociated,” “associated” and “indeterminate” — and one of the conditions that is assessed as “unassociated” is “medical evidence shows no causality.”
Taiwan Women’s Link founder and chairperson Huang Sue-ying (黃淑英) said the amendment added the phrase “medical evidence does not support causality” into the conditions for assessing an “unassociated” causal relationship, which would pass on the risk of adverse reactions to vaccine recipients.
She said vaccination is an important tool to help stop the COVID-19 pandemic, but many people are concerned that the AstraZeneca vaccine might cause blood clotting.
However, according to the amended article, the vaccine injury compensation working group might deem such cases as “unassociated,” as there is not enough scientific evidence to support a causal relationship, she said, adding that people’s right to vaccine injury relief would be greatly limited due to the amendment.
Academia Sinica Information Law Center director Chiou Wen-tsong (邱文聰) said that the phrase “medical evidence does not support causality” only means that current medical studies have not proven a causal relationship, but is not equal to having “no causal relationship.”
When vaccines are being administered under emergency use authorization, there might only be limited knowledge about their adverse effects, but if vaccine recipients have to bear the risk of adverse events, vaccine makers or the government would not have any incentive to further explore causal relationships between adverse events and vaccination, he said.
The groups urged the ministry to reconsider the amendment so that people can be better protected by the vaccine injury compensation program, which would increase their willingness to get vaccinated.
TENSIONS: The Chinese aircraft and vessels were headed toward the western Pacific to take part in a joint air and sea military exercise, the Ministry of National Defense said A relatively large number of Chinese military aircraft and vessels were detected in Taiwan’s vicinity yesterday morning, apparently en route to a Chinese military exercise in the western Pacific, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said. In a statement, the ministry said 36 Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) aircraft, including J-16 fighters and nuclear-capable H-6 bombers, crossed the median line of the Taiwan Strait or an extension of it, and were detected in the southern and southeastern parts of Taiwan’s air defense identification zone (ADIZ) from 5:20am to 9:30am yesterday. They were headed toward the western Pacific to take part in a
Honor guards are to stop performing changing of the guard ceremonies around a statue of Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) to avoid “worshiping authoritarianism,” the Ministry of Culture said yesterday. The fate of the bronze statue has long been the subject of fierce and polarizing debate in Taiwan, which has transformed from an autocracy under Chiang into one of Asia’s most vibrant democracies. The changing of the guard each hour at the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall in Taipei is a major tourist attraction, but starting from 9am on Monday, the ceremony is to be moved outdoors to Democracy Boulevard, outside the eponymous blue-and-white memorial
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) supports peaceful unification with China, and President William Lai (賴清德) is “a bit naive” for being a “practical worker for Taiwanese independence,” former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) said in an interview published yesterday. Asked about whether the KMT is on the same page as the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) on the issue of Taiwanese independence or unification with China, Ma told the Malaysian Chinese-language newspaper Sin Chew Daily that they are not. While the KMT supports peaceful unification and is against unification by force, the DPP opposes unification as such and
CASES SLOWING: Although weekly COVID-19 cases are rising, the growth rate has been falling, from 90 percent to 30 percent, 14 percent and 6 percent, the CDC said COVID-19 hospitalizations last week rose 6 percent to 987, while deaths soared 55 percent to 99, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said yesterday, adding that the recent wave of infections would likely peak this week. People aged 65 or older accounted for 79 percent of the hospitalizations and 90 percent of the deaths, the majority of whom have or had underlying health conditions, CDC data showed. The youngest hospitalized case last week was a six-month-old, who was born preterm and was unvaccinated, CDC physician Lin Yung-ching (林詠青) said. The infant had a fever, coughing and a runny nose early this month, but