redhead60707@... wrote:From: redhead60707@...
To: redhead60707@...
Subject: NYTimes.com Article: Republicans Press for Bill to Shield Vaccine
Makers From Suits
Date: Wed, 9 Apr 2003 00:29:28 -0400 (EDT)

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Republicans Press for Bill to Shield Vaccine Makers From Suits

April 9, 2003
By SHERYL GAY STOLBERG






WASHINGTON, April 8 - The mysterious new respiratory
ailment that has terrified people around the globe has
extended its reach to the Capitol, where Senate Republicans
are using the disease to press their case that vaccine
manufacturers should be shielded from lawsuits.

Led by Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, Republicans are
trying to revive the long-stalled measure. Today, Dr. Frist
linked his bill to the epidemic of severe acute respiratory
syndrome, or SARS, warning that pharmaceutical companies
would not produce vaccines against the disease unless they
were protected against "frivolous suits" that could drive
them out of business.

"If we need a vaccine for this potential global epidemic,
are we prepared?" Dr. Frist asked during a news conference
to publicize the bill. "The answer is no, absolutely not."

But whether that argument will hold sway in the Senate is
unclear. With the Committee on Health, Education, Labor and
Pensions scheduled to take up the legislation on Wednesday,
Republicans and Democrats spent the day deep in
negotiations over a provision that would dismiss thousands
of lawsuits filed by parents who assert that a
mercury-based vaccine preservative, thimerosal, caused
autism in their children.

Democrats are pressing for language to permit the parents
to seek compensation through a government "vaccine court,"
even if their claims fall outside the six-year statute of
limitations Dr. Frist has proposed. By late afternoon, an
agreement seemed near.

"We're close," said Senator Christopher J. Dodd, Democrat
of Connecticut and a central participant in the
negotiations. Asked about the Republicans' SARS argument,
Mr. Dodd shrugged. "We're talking about childhood vaccines.
It's another issue," he said.

But tonight, negotiations fell apart, people involved in
them said.

The legislation would overhaul the 1986 Vaccine Injury
Compensation Act, which created the vaccine court. The law
requires parents of children injured by vaccines to file
claims with the court before suing manufacturers. It
imposes a statute of limitations, three years from the date
of injury, and created a taxpayer-financed fund to pay the
awards.

But the 1986 law covers only vaccines, not vaccine
ingredients or additives - a loophole that has left
manufacturers vulnerable to lawsuits. Chief among them is
Eli Lilly, the developer of thimerosal. In recent years,
thousands of parents of autistic children have sued Lilly,
creating what Dr. Frist describes as "an end run around"
the vaccine court.

His bill would dismiss those lawsuits, but it would give
parents six years instead of three to file claims with the
vaccine court. The bill would also increase the cap on
awards for children's pain and suffering to $350,000 from
$250,000, and would permit parents to file claims for their
own pain and suffering.

Despite those concessions, the bill remains hugely
controversial - not so much because of its provisions, but
because of the way Republicans have handled it. Last year,
Republicans quietly inserted the thimerosal language into
legislation creating the Department of Homeland Security.
The provision immediately became known as the "Lilly
rider." It was struck from the security bill at the
insistence of parents and several moderate Republican
senators.

Among those parents are Laura and Scott Bono of Durham,
N.C., whose 14-year-old son Jackson has mercury poisoning
that they attribute to vaccines.

The Bonos assert that they would stand a better chance
against manufacturers in civil court than in the vaccine
court. Because there is no science linking thimerosal to
autism, the government fund has paid no claims to parents
who say their children were harmed by it.

Republicans say the bill is a fair alternative. The measure
has the support of the American Academy of Pediatrics and
other doctors' groups, and follows the recommendations of
an independent advisory committee.

It does not contain any provisions directly related to SARS
vaccine research. But in a climate where the latest news
story can often provide political advantage, the new
disease has become entwined with the vaccine legislation
nonetheless.

That became evident on Monday, when Dr. Anthony S. Fauci,
the leading infectious disease expert at the National
Institutes of Health, testified about SARS before the
Senate health committee. He said vaccine research on the
disease was in its infancy and the government would like
industry to get involved.

The committee chairman, Senator Judd Gregg, said the Senate
needed to pass the vaccine bill quickly. "We have this
N.I.H., which is such an extraordinary organization" in
conducting vaccine research, Mr. Gregg said later in an
interview. "The question is, do you have an industry that
is willing to take the risk?"

At today's news conference, both Mr. Gregg and Dr. Frist
hit hard on the SARS theme. But Senator Debbie Stabenow, a
Michigan Democrat and a leading opponent of the vaccine
bill, said she saw no connection.

"That's a very serious thing," she said of the new
epidemic, "and we certainly want to do everything we can to
help people. But you don't have to take away the rights of
parents of autistic children to do that."


2 More Suspected Cases


NICEVILLE, Fla., April 8 (AP) -
Two suspected cases of SARS in the Florida Panhandle were
confirmed today by the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention. The victims, a child and a related middle-aged
woman, have not required hospitalization. That brings the
total of suspected cases in Florida to seven. The C.D.C.
reported 148 suspected cases in 30 states today.



http://www.nytimes.com/2003/04/09/science/sciencespecial/09VACC.html?ex=10508625\
68&ei=1&en=2a98d2c8ae69f2a1



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