Kamal Ghorui
NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Tuesday directed the Centre to frame a no-fault compensation policy for those who suffer from serious adverse effects from COVID-19 vaccine.A bench of justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta said that the existing mechanism for monitoring adverse events following immunisation shall continue.“Union of India to frame a no-fault compensation policy for serious adverse events following COVID-19 vaccination. The existing mechanism for monitoring adverse events following immunisation shall continue and relevant data may be periodically placed in the public domain,” the apex court ordered.“No separate court-appointed expert body is considered necessary in view of the existing mechanism for scientific assessment of adverse events following immunisation,” it added.However, the apex court said that introduction of such a compensation scheme should not be viewed as an admission of any fault on the government’s part.Supreme Court’s delivered its verdict on pleas, including one which alleged that two women lost their lives in 2021 after taking the first dose of the Covishield vaccine. The petition further alleged that both of them suffered from severe adverse effects following immunisation.Earlier in 2022, Kerala high court directed the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) to “expeditiously” frame a policy for identifying those who died due to after effects of Covid-19 immunisation and compensating their dependents.Justice V G Arun directed the NDMA to do the needful “as expeditiously as possible”, but within three months of its order dated September 1.The direction was issued after Justice Arun said he himself, in his current jurisdiction, has come across three such cases which claimed that a person who had undergone Covid-19 immunisation had succumbed to the after-effects of vaccination.
