08.06.07
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Families today saw their group claim in the high court
for damages on behalf of children allegedly damaged by the MMR triple vaccination
collapse.
A high court judge, Justice Keith, ruled that all but two claims against
various pharmaceutical companies must be discontinued, under threat of being
struck out, because the withdrawal of legal aid by the legal services commission
had made their pursuit impossible.
But the judge stressed that his ruling did
not amount to a rejection of any of the claims that MMR had seriously damaged
the children concerned.
The court heard that in one case, a medical re- port concluded that
the damage could not be attributed to any cause other than MMR. However, legal
aid was withdrawn even in this case, not because of its merits, but because
the likely damages were too low compared with the legal costs involved.
Despite years of litigation, which at one time peaked with 2,500 children
in the group, the judge said in his judgement handed down today that the court
had never addressed the issue of damage allegedly caused by MMR.
The two remaining cases, where children had succeeded in having legal
aid restored last month, will continue as separate claims, with the “group”
claim being formally disbanded.
The collapse of all the other cases because they had no public funding
comes a month after the FOIA Centre revealed that another high court judge
who had blocked legal aid has a brother who sits on the board of a drugs company
embroiled in the litigation.
The ruling by Sir Nigel Davis – whose brother, Sir Crispin Davis,
is a non-executive director of GlaxoSmithKline – to dismiss the attempt
to restore legal aid left many families without lawyers to represent them.
So, the group dwindled as parents, the children’s “litigation
friends”, discontinued their claims.
The FOIA Centre also disclosed, following a series of disclosures under
the freedom of information act (FOIA), how parliament was misled over the
safety of the MMR triple vaccination that was used for four years in Britain.
Three months ago, we revealed that Whitehall documents, obtained under
FOIA, show how government health officials and experts gradually learnt from
1987 of the dangers of this triple vaccine, containing the Urabe mumps strain,
before it was used for 85% of MMR injections for four years following the
launch of the UK measles-mumps-rubella programme in 1988.
This type of MMR is known to cause encephalitis adverse reactions,
including meningitis, among some children. These conditions – which
variously involve swelling of the brain or of the lining of the brain or spinal
chord – can lead to brain damage, deafness or even death.
Parents of some children in the group litigation had, at various times,
discontinued their legal actions to avoid being dismissed, while some claims
have been struck out after a failure to withdraw.
In Justice Keith’s ruling today, following a hearing at the end
of last month, he said that parents of six other children who had so far persisted
must, within 28 days, discontinue their claims, otherwise he would dismiss
them.
He said: “It is important for the claimants’ litigation
friends to understand why their children’s claims are not being allowed
to proceed. It is not because the court thinks that the claims have
no merit. Although this litigation has been going on for very many years,
the question as to whether the claims have merit has never been addressed
by the court.
“The reason why the claims have not been allowed to proceed is
because everyone has realistically recognised for some time that it is just
not practicable for the claims to proceed without public funding. With no
realistic prospect of public funding being restored for any of the claims,
save for the two which are now to proceed as unitary actions, the dissolution
of the litigation became inevitable.” (Emphasis as given in written
judgement.)
“My final words must go to the claimants’ litigation friends,”
he added. “No one can fail to have enormous sympathy for the parents
of the children to whom this litigation has related. They have spoken eloquently
and with great feeling of the tragedies that befell them when their children
became ill. They blame the vaccines produced by the defendants for damaging
their children, and they are bitter over their inability to proceed with their
claims.
“But when they came to court, they always ex-pressed themselves
in a measured and moderate tone, despite their disenchantment with the legal
services commission which they believe has let them down, and at all times
they treated the court with courtesy and respect. They made my difficult task
less wearing than it might otherwise have been. I am grateful to them for
that.”
At the last hearing, a sense of the desperation of the parents of damaged
children was given by one mother, Elaine Butler.
She told the court: “I just want to, if I may, briefly revisit
my distress and despair over the shameful treatment of my son.”
“At every step of the way, we have been fraught with difficulties.
We have got no legal represent-ation, we have not got legal funding, we are
having to sit in situations like this where we find it extremely difficult
to actually understand and keep up with what is going on.”
“Our children are damaged for life. It is our lifetime obligation
to do something about that, and I just sincerely regret the difficulties that
we have faced in trying to do that.
“I have tried to be heard and listened to since January 1991
when my son was damaged, and, every step along the way, we have been fraught,
we have been abandoned, we have been betrayed, every step of the way. It is
extremely difficult for us as parents. I have to go back to him tonight. We
live with that, day in, day out.
“And all I can say is that you get to a point in time where you
think to yourself, ‘Well perhaps, you know, perhaps I don't mind very
much any more whether people believe me, whether that vaccine, the concoction
that it was, did the damage or not.’
“What I do hope is that no other parents, and none of the parents
or none of the people that have been involved in my son's situation, ever
have to play the Russian roulette game that we did, and we lost.”
“I just hope that their children, their grandchildren and their
great grandchildren are not affected by this game of Russian roulette which
we sincerely regret having been dragged into.
“I thank you for your time and patience. It is important on behalf
of my son. He cannot express himself. He probably will never, ever be able
to express himself in his life, and I know the reason for that and I will
stand firm on that. Thank you.”
Documents on MMR were obtained by the FOIA Centre acting on behalf
of one of the parents of a child in the group litigation against various pharmaceutical
companies.
Comment on this article
FOIA
Centre news archive: the MMR files
Comments on MMR (13)
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