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Benefits Of Vaccination

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Millions of Americans get vaccinated every year to protect themselves from the flu and other communicable diseases. Most of these vaccinations are totally safe or cause very mild side effects, but in some circumstances, they can cause serious side effects or even death. When serious or fatal side effects occur, the national Vaccine Injury Compensation Program (VICP) allows victims to file a personal injury suit and claim damages.

However, this does not necessarily place fault, or mean that the vaccine caused injury. Over 80% of compensation is the result of a negotiated settlement wherein the Department of Health and Human Services has not concluded that the vaccine was responsible for injury. Still, individuals who feel they were injured because of a vaccination should not hesitate to …show more content…

Because the awarding body is federally funded, there are several eligibility requirements, which are as follows:

• The injury must have lasted more than six months after the vaccination, or…

• The injury required hospitalization and/or surgery, or…

• The vaccination resulted in death.

There is also a statute of limitations on vaccine injury cases. Claimants must file within three years of the onset of symptoms. If the claimant is a family member of a victim, he or she must file within two years after the death of the victim, or four years after the first symptoms surface.
In addition to eligibility and statute of limitations, victims are only allowed to file claims for a specific set of injuries under a specific set of guidelines. Claimants must prove the following:

• The injury must be listed on the VICP's Vaccine Injury table, and…

• The symptoms surfaced within the designated time frame, or…

• One of the covered vaccines is found to have caused the injury, or…

• The vaccine exacerbated an existing

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