Shea- Sad though, isn’t it?

John- I agree that some level of liability protection is necessary, and alluded to this in several posts on Health care and Judicial reform some time back. (Go archive diving if you are curious.) But blanket protection is not only specious, but an unwise green light to manufacturers to ignore safety concerns and go only for the bottom line.
Second, although we’ve had flu vaccine shortages, the fact remains that no flu shot can really protect you from the flu the way other vaccines do. At best, you get minimized symptoms due to the ever mutating nature of flu. In general, I am in favor of vaccines, even with their associated risks, but don’t think that those who do suffer adverse vaccine reactions should be simply out of luck. Often the adverse effects are very costly to the finances of those affected.

My rant here was primarily about the way this action progressed, which was quite sneaky, and less about the law itself, though I obviously have a few problems with that as well.

Good to hear from you again.

Liam- It is one thing to help someone in dire need, of which those who get a preemptive flu shot are not. It is another to excuse any manufacturer from all liability for their product, especially when those doing the excusing are also benefitting fromt he industry they seek to protect.

Further, if a flu pandemic did strike, there is no reason to believe that a flu vaccine would be all that effective. Most of the time they only minimize symptoms, not prevent the disease itself. And as flu virus are well know mutators, the vaccine could easily have a low rate of efficacy. All the more reason for the pharma to tinker a bit more and keep trying untested products on the population at large without any recourse.

We could have easily crafted ’emergency’ laws that made sense in the light of day instead of this dark of night give-away, which as I said above is my main beef here. Where was the honest dialogue? Hidden beneath a pile of cash, that’s where.

I know this isn’t the biggest fish to fry, just another piece of the growing lack of representation we get with the current crop of politicians in office these days.

Glad you stopped by again.

Windspike- Yoou got that right. At least, that’s the configuration we have today. Not really the way it’s supposed to be though.

Floyd- Nice to hear from you again. Yes, we really do need to pass a law making bills single issue and not these big omnibus bills that everyone and their mother throws some piece of legislation into.

On the one hand, I completely agree that this was a highly unusual and unethical way to get this legislation passed.

On the other hand, it is not unprecedented to offer this sort of protection in the case of emergencies. Good Samaritan laws, for example, are designed to protect people from prosecution who try to help someone in dire need.

I have to think that if this were REALLY a huge give-away to Big Pharma, they’d have language in there that capped liability in ALL cases. To put laws in place that say “Look, if we have an emergency and we need to move quickly, there may be some shortcuts necessary for the greater good.”

I don’t particularly like the lack of repercussions, it does sort of let the pharma companies have carte blanche in terms of safety and effecacy. But if a pandemic hits this continent and there’s a very real possibility of large percentages of the population dying off, there is definitely a balance to be struck. On the one hand, preventing snake-oil salesmen who sell useless or even harmful products. On the other, unnecessarily slowing down the speed with which new vaccines can be made and released, while every hour of delay means massive death.

Nevertheless, I guess I do have to agree that if there were really no ulterior motive, if this were really just in the public good, it should have been debated on the floor of the Congress and gone through the normal channels.

I just wanted to point out that it isn’t as cut and dried as some of the other scandals relating to the current Administration.

Liam.

Every major US vaccine maker has pulled out of making flu vaccine; only Chiron and Aventis Pasteur are left.

For three years running, we have had major shortages, and we have been damn lucky we have not been hit with a bad strain.

Vaccine work is difficult, expensive and yes, you have a (low) chance of bad reactions and infection. But that risk is way out of proportion to the benefit of having a vaccine available.

Next year, during flu season, we will once again have a shortage, and we will begging the Europeans for any vaccine they can spare. Their vaccines will have the higher risks than ours (less oversight – which is why Chiron produces their vaccines over there).

Theoretically, a bad flu season could lead to the deaths of thousands of unvaccinated kids.

I’m damn tired of trying to get flu vaccine for my kids because there is none available. Last year, my four year old went without so that my toddler wcould be protected.

All so the trial lawyers could keep on suing….