IIn the appeal process against the corona vaccine manufacturer Astra-Zeneca because of possible vaccination damage, the Bamberg Higher Regional Court decided on Monday to obtain an expert opinion. The fourth civil senate of the court said that the procedure was “not yet ready for a decision”.
A 33-year-old woman from Upper Franconia, who was vaccinated with the corona vaccine “Vaxzevria” from Astra-Zeneca in March 2021, complained. The next day she was initially given sick leave because of fever, headaches and body aches and a few days later she complained of severe abdominal pain. The doctors at the hospital found that a vein in his intestine was blocked. The patient had to have about three meters of her small intestine removed. Since then she has been severely restricted in her everyday life and professionally, she has suffered from pain and depression. The pharmaceutical manufacturer has “systematically downplayed” the risk of a so-called thrombosis, she argues. Astra-Zeneca counters that in a study with 24,000 subjects there was no evidence of thrombosis as a possible side effect of the vaccination.
The court announced on Monday that the Senate currently does not see sufficient evidence for liability of the group. For this it would be necessary that after the formal approval of the vaccine, which did not take place until the end of October 2022, “new findings would have arisen that would have stood in the way of approval”. However, the side effects were known at the time of approval and taken into account accordingly.
Have the risks been adequately explained?
The situation is less clear when it comes to the question of whether the plaintiff was sufficiently informed about possible risks. With a view to possible liability, the court now wants to obtain an expert opinion. “The Senate is currently assuming that the plaintiff would not have been vaccinated with the defendant’s vaccine if the risk of intestinal vein thrombosis had been presented in the defendant’s specialist information,” it says. The report is intended to clarify whether the risk of vascular occlusion in the intestine should have been mentioned based on the scientific status at the time. After the young woman was vaccinated with “Vaxzevria”, the Standing Committee on Vaccination changed its recommendations on how to use the preparation. From April 2021, the drug should no longer be used in younger people because they have an “increased risk of thromboembolic events”.
The plaintiff is demanding compensation of at least 250,000 euros and damages of 17,200 euros from Astra-Zeneca. In addition, she demands that the company pays for future damages up to an amount of 600,000 euros. In January, the Hof district court dismissed her lawsuit. There is “no indication whatsoever” that the company had reliable evidence of any risk of thrombosis. It is also not decisive that the vaccination may have had a “negative benefit-risk profile” for her. According to the court, the entirety of the users is essential.
According to her lawyer, the plaintiff has applied for benefits under the Infection Protection Act and receives 283 euros a month. According to research by the FAZ in spring, a little more than 7,000 applications for care after suspected corona vaccination damage were made nationwide by mid-March. By then, more than 1300 applications had already been decided, but in most cases negatively. The authorities only recognized vaccination damage with a claim for care in just under 300 cases.
Compared to the sheer size of the government vaccination campaign, these numbers are comparatively small. As reported by the Robert Koch Institute, almost 65 million people in Germany received at least one corona vaccination by the beginning of August, which corresponds to almost 78 percent of the population. In total, more than 192 million individual vaccinations have been administered.
In most cases, a vaccine from the manufacturer Biontech was used, and the preparation called “Comirnaty” accounted for more than 142 million individual vaccinations, which corresponds to almost 74 percent. The drug “Vaxzevria” from the pharmaceutical company Astra-Zeneca was administered just under 13 million times, which corresponds to less than seven percent of all individual vaccinations.
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