The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday denied a news report that it ignored a Presidential Office request to respond to a petition regarding a vaccine injury compensation case rejected by the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program (VICP) claim evaluation committee.
The Chinese-language news site CTWant yesterday reported that a 42-year-old woman died of acute cerebral edema shortly after she received a third dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, adding that a hospital provided a diagnosis certificate saying the cause of death was associated with the vaccine.
After the VICP claim evaluation committee rejected the family’s case, they hired a lawyer to petition President William Lai (賴清德), whose office asked the Ministry of Health and Welfare to handle the case, the report said.
Photo: Lin Hui-chin, Taipei Times
However, the ministry took nearly a month to reply, and it refused to provide data requested by the family — the committee meeting’s recording and the references they cited, the Web site said.
CDC Deputy Director-General Philip Lo (羅一鈞) yesterday told a news briefing in Taipei that the committee conducts independent reviews and is comprised of medical and law specialists and disinterested persons, with 24 members.
Each vaccine injury claim is carefully reviewed, including having medical professionals examine the medical records and examination results, before making a preliminary report, he said, adding that law experts and disinterested people then give further suggestions.
The report and suggestions are then discussed in a meeting before the committee makes a final decision, which is delivered in a report to the applicant and publicized on the CDC’s Web site, he added.
If an applicant is not satisfied with the final decision, they can appeal or file for administrative litigation if they do not accept the result of the appeal, he said.
Presenting a letter from the Presidential Office, Lo said the case was transferred to the Executive Yuan’s secretary-general on Aug. 28, and the secretary-general transferred the letter to the health ministry on Aug. 30.
The directive from the Presidential Office was that the petitioning lawyer had asked for the VICP committee meeting’s recording and references, so the ministry should handle the case and directly respond to the petition applicant, while notifying the office, he said.
The CDC on Sept. 19 replied to the applicant in a letter, and also notified the ministry, Lo said, adding that “directly respond” does not mean it must provide the recording and references to the applicant, but only that it should directly inform the applicant the result of the discussions.
Regarding the meeting recordings, as they include medical records and personal data, the ministry does not preserve or publicize them, and it does not intend to change that policy at this time, he said.
As for the news site’s report that the ministry hired three lawyers to counter the applicant, Lo said the VICP received many applications regarding COVID-19 vaccinations, so it commissioned a law firm that assigns one to three lawyers to handle the cases, so the number of lawyers for any given case is decided by the firm, not the ministry.
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