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The Autism Cases, and What's Next

BY Janice G. Inman
April 28, 2009

The fight to get recognition of a link between autism and childhood vaccines took a heavy blow in February when the U.S. Court of Federal Claims found no such connection in the three test cases before it. Results of recent studies certainly portended these outcomes, but hope remained that the so-called Vaccine Court ' the Office of Special Masters of the U.S. Court of Federal Claims ' might side with the claimants.

The claimants were seeking compensation from the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program (VICP) (See 42 U.S.C. ' 300aa-10, et. seq.), a program set up in 1988 by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to compensate those who are injured by certain vaccines. In order to collect on a VICP claim, petitioning parents must generally show that: 1) their child received a vaccine covered by VICP; 2) the vaccine was given in the United States; 3) the child suffered a serious and long-term injury because of the vaccination; and 4) there has been no previous award or settlement concerning that injury. (In certain cases, if an injury is a well-known side-effect of a particular vaccine, and it is listed in what is called the “Vaccine Injury Table,” the petitioners need show only that the victim received the vaccine and that he or she suffered the injury listed in the table in order to recover.)

Many more claims brought by parents of children who began showing signs of autism soon after they received the MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) vaccination are in the pipeline. The three cases decided in February, however, were considered some of the strongest for the claimant side. Looking at one of these cases and at the special master's reasoning for rejecting petitioners' claims gives some indication of where the Vaccine Court can be expected to go with the remainder of these cases.

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