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By Alison Despathy
H.545 moved out of the House and now resides in Senate Health and Welfare for consideration. The committee is scheduled to vote on this bill at 10am Tuesday, February 10.
H.545 has several key provisions. Specifically H.545:
- Authorizes the Commissioner of Health to issue immunization recommendations for children and adults as part of the Department’s immunization program and purchase immunizations from either the Center for Disease Control or another vendor and requires health insurers to cover recommended immunizations
- Provides immunity from civil and administrative liability for adverse events and death from immunizations for healthcare professionals acting in accordance with the standing orders and amends the membership of the Vermont Immunization Advisory Council
No one has any issue with the Commissioner’s continued ability to procure and purchase vaccines at a cost savings, including a requirement that health insurers fully cover recommended vaccines. This is already currently the law and slight expansions in this bill are not controversial. There are also no vaccine mandates included in this bill.
The Commissioner’s ability to create a state based recommended schedule that could differ from the federally recommended schedule as well as offering a liability shield for health care professionals administering immunizations if injury or death occurs, without alerting patients or providing a standard for informed consent are the issues at hand. Constitutionality is of concern, meaning as currently written, if this bill becomes law, it will likely be litigated, as has been indicated.
The Federally recommended vaccine schedule recently shifted after comprehensive analysis by Health and Human Services (HHS). A comparison with the recommended schedules of 20 ‘peer countries’ Australia, Greece, Japan, France, UK etc, were reviewed to determine ‘consensus vaccines’, number of diseases and total injections given.
The US was an outlier with the highest number of vaccines given to children and almost twice as many compared to some ‘peer countries.’ Currently the pharmaceutical industry and those administering vaccines cannot be held liable for any adverse events deaths from vaccines on the federally recommended schedule. This is a result of the 1986 National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act, which stemmed from the fact that many children were killed and injured from a Diphtheria, Pertussis, Tetanus (DPT) vaccine causing widespread neurological damage with lawsuits so rampant all but one vaccine manufacture went out of business.
Instead of directing the pharmaceutical industry to make safer products, a liability shield was granted and a special Vaccine Court and a National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program were created. Unfortunately and really criminally, this has become the cost of doing business for Big Pharma. If your child dies, like Nicole Matten of Barton, Vermont who lost her 7 year old daughter to myocarditis from a Fluzone vaccine containing mercury, you receive the highest payout of $250,000 dollars. Heartbreaking.
$5,530,623,153.83 has been paid to those injured or killed by vaccines since 1988.
This liability shield has resulted in compromised vaccine safety monitoring and there is both federal and state-level legislation to repeal and amend this law with hopes of making pharmaceutical companies responsible for the safety of their vaccine products. None of the vaccines on the federally recommended schedule have been tested with a double, blind, placebo control clinical trial and safety assessments have only been done for several days to months. Read that again.
Compare this to medications that Big Pharma is liable for which are tested against placebos with safety monitoring ranging from 2 – 8 years such as Lipitor, Lyrica, Enbrel, Eliquis etc. Why would Big Pharma pay to ensure a vaccine is safe, if they are not responsible for any harm done by their product? We should not expect anything else from convicted serial felons, responsible for profits to their shareholders.
The recent Federal changes did not remove access to any vaccines and all are still covered by insurance with the liability shield in place. Instead, the updated schedule created three categories of vaccines: the recommended childhood immunization schedule, vaccines for those in high risk population or groups, and shared clinical decision making for several vaccines. This move aligns the US vaccine schedule with other ‘peer countries’, specifically Denmark.
Now if you think of it, shouldn’t all vaccines fall into the shared clinical decision making category? Talk with your doctor, go through your history, behaviors, lifestyle choices, and a thorough benefit risk analysis of a vaccine, just like you would and should for all medication and medical procedures.
H.545 would allow the state of VT to create their own recommended immunization schedule that could differ from the federal schedule and would offer healthcare providers a liability shield. Herein lies multiple problems in addition to creating widespread confusion, risk and legal recourse deficiencies.
The best way to assess this issue is an example of Recombivax HB vaccine, the hepatitis B vaccine typically injected into babies on the first day of life. Hepatitis B vaccine is still available to all but has shifted to the category of high risk population, instead of routine injection for infants in the first 24 hours of life.
Recombivax HB,was licensed in 1986 immediately after Big Pharma was offered a liability shield for any damages caused by vaccines. It was the first genetically modified virus used in a vaccine and it contains 250mcg of aluminum, a known neurotoxin, at a level 14 times greater than the allowable amount of aluminum in intravenous parenteral nutrition for an 8 pound baby.
- Prior to licensure, Recombivax HB was only studied for 5 days of safety monitoring with 147 children up to 10 years of age.
- On October 12, 2017, Informed Consent Action Network (ICAN) sent a letter to HHS requesting the Hepatitis B safety data.
- On January, 18, 2018, HHS and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) sent a letter that failed to provide further clinical trial safety data. Two more letters were submitted to the FDA requesting safety data and were ignored.
- Next a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) demanding a copy of the clinical trials used to license Recombivax was submitted and a 1264 page document was finally shared by the FDA and confirmed that the vaccine was only reviewed for a few days of safety monitoring post injection.
- On September 4, 2020, ICAN filed a petition to the FDA, “Demanding that the licensure of the Hepatitis B vaccine be revoked or suspended until their safety, as required by law, is determined in a properly designed clinical trial of sufficient duration.”
The Vermont Department of Heath has stated that they continue to recommend the hepatitis B vaccine for infants on the first day of life. Do you think parents know the history of Recombivax HB and that there are pending lawsuits based on insufficient safety monitoring? How might this affect their decisions? Is a healthcare provider ensuring informed consent with patients by offering a thorough benefit risk analysis? Did you receive informed consent when your child received a hepatitis B vaccine on the first day of life?
If the state is going to create its own recommended schedule that differs from the federal schedule, what is this based upon? Who has access to the full clinical trials and research paid for my Big Pharma? These are not public records –although they should be– they are difficult to attain and typically require FOIA and lawsuits to the FDA and HHS to access.
Does the state have resources and expertise to justify their deviation from the federally recommended immunization schedule? And if they do and providers have a liability shield from the state, if there is no longer federal preemption, does a patient have a right to know that the provider is not liable for death or damage from a vaccine?
Should there be full transparency about the situation and a guaranteed and substantive requirement for informed consent? Should a patient have to attest to having received informed consent and understanding that the provider holds a liability shield. This is a basic consumer safety issue and in order to balance the scales of justice, there must be legal recourse, transparency and guaranteed informed consent provided to the patient,
The federal government had to do exactly this when the 1986 National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act passed Congress: a compensation program was created because a liability shield was offered to Big Pharma and vaccine administrators and there must be a path for legal recourse. A task force to study vaccine safety was also put in place and now 40 years later is finally and just recently activated to do the originally intended work of ensuring vaccine safety. Also a 10 page document was originally mandated to be used by doctors while communicating benefits and risks with patients in order to ensure informed consent.
Are you offered an honest benefit risk analysis when you receive a vaccine? Are you aware that Big Pharma and those administering vaccines cannot be held liable for federally recommended vaccines that maim or kill? Do you know that many flu vaccines still contain mercury, a potent neurotoxin? Do you know that the mercury from most vaccines was removed after it was determined that this neurotoxin was causing damage and then it was replaced with aluminum, another neurotoxin? Do you know that Measles, Mumps Rubella and Chicken Pox vaccines contain billions of human DNA and cells from aborted fetuses in each dose? Or that the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program recognizes encephalopathy (brain inflammation) and Guillain-Barre syndrome as known side effects caused by some vaccines and approved for compensation.
Would this information impact your decisions? Do you think that those giving vaccines should be required to convey this information, versus just saying these are ‘safe and effective’ or giving a Vaccine Information Statement which the CDC for decades has said does not constitute informed consent?
This is a glimpse into the issues at hand. What schedule will healthcare providers promote, which will schools use? Why is this necessary if all vaccines are still available, supposedly safe and effective and a patient can work with their provider to make their own private and personal healthcare decisions.
These are several of the currently unanswered questions related to H.545, which have raised constitutionality concerns as well as consumer protection issues for Vermonters. A lawsuit has been filed against a key supporter for H.545, the American Academy of Pediatrics. The lawsuit alleges “Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (“RICO”), against the American Academy of Pediatrics for its central role in an enterprise that has defrauded American families about the safety of the childhood vaccine schedule for several decades.”
The author is a clinical nutritionist in St. Johnsbury.
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Categories: Commentary, Legislation
Thank you Alison for a thorough review of this issue. Another unanswered question is who among the sponsors of this bill have been getting their palms greased and who is greasing them? Or are they just that unthinkingly naive?
Thank you Allison for this comprehensive summary of what’s at stake here. Vaccines that have never been tested for safety? What could possibly go wrong? It isn’t rocket science to understand that the CDC’s prior vaccine schedule of 72 injections by the age of 18yo (all containing metals; aluminum &/or mercury in the form of thimerosal), i.e., #72 untested injections recommended BEFORE the CDC schedule was amended.
IMHO, this schedule was more reflective of their GREED and lack of responsible health care by the pharmaceutical manufacturers, than it was about our children’s HEALTH.
Everyone knows Chicken Pox was never a threat to our health; when I was growing up we had “Chicken Pox Parties” so families could just get it out of the way. Natural herd immunity trumps anything given by injection. The only people who should be getting the Chicken Pox vaccine are adults who never had Chicken Pox as a child (e.g., sometimes immigrants never exposed); or the immunocompromised. Children rarely become seriously ill from varicella.
The Hep B vaccine (series of 3 shots) use to only be given to high risk individuals for decades; IV drug abusers, sex-workers & Medical staff (MD’s, Nurses, EMT’s & Phlebotomists) & Frontline Staff (Police/ Fireman) who may have exposure to blood, blood products, or accidental needle sticks. It is ludicrous to stick 8lb infants with injections containing antigens (which can also induce allergies) and/or metals (aluminum); a known neuro-toxin.
For every illness caused by this overzealous injection of “vaccines” for infections our children are not even at risk of getting — BILLION$ of dollars in profits come rolling into the pharmaceutical industry; not just the cost of the vaccines themselves, but for the millions of required individual epi-pens & inhalers per each child needed stocked for the resulting allergies & asthma they cause (antigens injected into children can cause allergies / immune hypersensitivity; this is a known fact of immunology) .
I wonder if people are even aware that because the manufacturers use eggs in the manufacturing of the influenza vaccine – that this can theoretically INDUCE their child to be allergic to eggs; one of nature’s most nutritious protein sources.
The influenza virus, recommended by 6 months of age, is grown inside a fertilized eggs to make the influenza vaccine (which contains ovalbumin); which can result in antigen-hypersensitivity causing an allergy to eggs. The immune system mistakes egg proteins (specifically ovalbumin in egg whites) as harmful invaders, triggering an IgE antibody response.
And, then we have an increase in *asthma (which frequently goes hand-in-hand with environmental & food allergies). Vermont has one of the highest pediatric asthma rates in the U.S. (7%–8% of children) ranking 2nd in the U.S.
The small sects of homeschooled & Amish children that we have as our ONLY “control” group; are significantly healthier than any of the children following the CDC schedule. NOTE: he pharmaceutical vaccine manufacturers never bothered to take the responsibility of having “CONTROL Groups” in their research of safety (i.e., ever since the 1986 NCVIA ~ giving them freedom from liability) showing gross malfeasance & negligence on their behalf. A disgrace.
We need Vermont’s Legislators to care about our children’s health if the CDC, the FDA and Pharmaceutical Manufacturers don’t.
When my eldest grandchild, now 3, was born in Florida, I was there and warded off a Neo-natal nurse who arrived needle in hand to administer Hep B. “We can give this now or you can wait for your pediatrician.” All mothers are tested for Hep B prior to hospital admission; with no history of intravenous drug use, it’s a ridiculous, dangerous shot. Hep B, if given within the first month, is associated with an increase in neurological disorders.
This same child developed extensive eczema immediately after the varicella (chicken pox) inoculation, thankfully one of the shots now deemed discretionary but pushed by pediatricians.
Then there’s the rotavirus shot (also discretionary), if administered outside the recommended window, can lead to a deadly complication called intussusception.
This shot was pushed despite my grandson having aged out of the safe time frame.
My daughter does her own research but in general, available information skews to accepted protocols, despite mountains of evidence proving harm.
Until Pharma companies are liable for their products, informed consent is critical for parents to make informed choices. Given her brothers experience with the chicken pox vax, my granddaughter, now 10 months, will skip it.
Being the father of three daughters, ages 30-50 think back to when they were born and infants, in late 1970’s remembering 5 or 6 vaccines and in the nineties about 8. Am a supporter of the concept of vaccines when proper research and reasoning is applied, but there is, going back to an old saying ‘too much of a good thing’. Totally against the mRNA vaccines in the way they are used which violates the reasoning they were invented for.
In 1997, one of our sons mysteriously got intussusception at eight months old. It was truly an emergency, and we had to take him to Burlington. I just read about the causal link between the original rotavirus vaccine, which was removed from the market in 1999 because of this link and safety concerns, and intussusception. I imagine he had probably received that vaccine prior to this emergency.
This is the first I’ve ever heard of this. We never knew why.
Thank you, Alison, for your tireless and excellent work.
This potential law is not even necessary. All vaccines are available to Vermonters, without out-of-pocket cost. This is stated on the CDC website in the “FACTS” section. This is going to be another costly law for us. Since the American Academy of Pediatric is being sued for fraud & racketeering under the RICO Act, the brakes should be applied to this bill. I’m alarmed that it was rushed through the House without enough time to ask representatives questions about it.
I agree with the 4 people who already commented, so I will bring up other facets of this bill. I’m hoping that someone who understands the legal wording of a bill will be able to explain it. Here are some of my concerns, knowing that a word or even a change of a Capital letter to a lower case one makes a difference in a law’s meaning:
On Page 2 lines 13 -16
The word “Vermonters” is crossed out and replaced with all individuals domiciled in the State.
13 (b)(1) The Department of Health shall administer an immunization program with the goals of ensuring universal access to recommended 14 immunizations for all individuals domiciled in the State at no 15 charge to the individual.
However, on page 3 line 8 to 11 it uses the word “Vermonters”, not “all individuals domiciled in the State”. Why is this change of wording? Won’t the “ domiciled individuals” data be gathered too? I’m very uneasy about the change of language.
3) The Department shall gather and analyze data regarding the 8 immunization program for the purpose of ensuring its quality and maximizing 9 protection of Vermonters against diseases preventable by 10 immunization.
What “data” will be “gathered and analyzed”? Would it include names? DOB?
On Page 4 lines 5-8
(f) The Department shall charge each health insurer a surcharge for the 5 costs and administration of the immunization program. The surcharge shall be 6 deposited into an existing special fund and used solely for the purpose of 7 administering the program.
This makes it sound as if Vermonters won’t be charged- that the program will pay for itself. BUT, don’t you think that health insurers will kick it back to those who are insured? Health care is a for profit business.
What about the 9 (un-elected) officials, when the Immunization Funding Advisory Committee is established? Will there be a stipend or financial compensation to be on this committee? It doesn’t specify this in the bill. Will they work for free?
See page 4 & 5 establishing a 9 member Immunization Funding Advisory Committee (g)(1) The Immunization Funding Advisory Committee is established to 9 provide the Commissioner of Health with an annual per-member per-month 10 cost for vaccines recommended immunizations for the pediatric population, an 11 annual per-member per-month cost for vaccines recommended immunizations12 for the adult population, and a recommendation for the amount of the yearly13
vaccine immunization assessment. The Committee shall comprise the 14 following nine members:15 (A) the Executive Officer of the Board of Pharmacy;16 (B) the Executive Director of the Green Mountain Care Board;17 (C) a representative of the Vermont Blueprint for Health, nominated 18 by the Director of the Blueprint and appointed by the Commissioner of Health; (D) three representatives of health insurers, one from each of the 1 State’s largest private health insurers, as determined by the number of covered 2 lives, appointed by the Commissioner of Health; 3 (E) a representative of the American Academy of Pediatrics, 4 Vermont chapter, appointed by the Commissioner of Health; 5 (F) a representative of the American Academy of Family Medicine,6 Vermont chapter, appointed by the Commissioner of Health; and 7 (G) a representative of employers that self-insure for health coverage, 8 appointed by the Commissioner of Health
What does administrative support look like/mean? “The Committee shall receive 11 administrative support from the Department of Health.” Will another person need to be hired to provide administrative support for this new committee? OR, will existing Dept. of Health personnel take on the additional work?
Even 9 more (un-elected officials) on the “to be created” Vermont Immunization Advisory Council: See pages 7 & 8
§ 1131. VERMONT IMMUNIZATION ADVISORY COUNCIL 19 (a) Creation. There is created the Vermont Immunization Advisory 20 Council for the purpose of providing education policy, medical, and epidemiological expertise and advice to the Department with regard to the 1 safety of immunizations and immunization schedules. 2 (b) Membership. The Council shall be composed of the following 3 members: (1) a representative of the Vermont Board of Medical Practice, 5 appointed by the Governor; 6 (2) the Secretaries of Human Services and of Education or their 7 designees 8 (3) the State epidemiologist or designee; 9 (4) the Department of Health’s Immunization Program Manager or 10 designee;11 (5) a practicing pediatrician licensed pursuant to 26 V.S.A. chapter 23 or12 33, appointed by the Governor; 13 (6) two individuals who are professors, researchers, or physicians 14 licensed pursuant to 26 V.S.A. chapter 23 or 33, or any combination these 15 individuals, with expertise in infectious disease and human immunizations,16 appointed by the Governor; 17 (7) a family or internal medicine physician licensed pursuant to 2618 V.S.A. chapter 23 or 33, appointed by the Governor; 19 (5)(8) a representative of both public and independent schools, 20 appointed by the Governor; and 6)(9) any other persons deemed necessary by the Commissioner. The Council shall have the administrative assistance of the Department.
Do council members serve without financial compensation? Administrative assistance cost?
Thank you so much, Alison, for helping to educate us!