Court says citizens can claim compensation for serious vaccine injury

People who can prove they have suffered serious injury or side effects from a vaccine can claim compensation from the State, Greece’s top administrative court said on Monday.

For a citizen to turn against the state, certain conditions must be met, according to the ruling issued by the first division of the court, chaired by Council of State vice-president Maria Karamanov.

The person must be able to prove that the injury resulted from the vaccine, that the inoculation was part of a state-sponsored drive to protect public health and that it was done using a legal vaccine.

If these prerequisites are met a person can claim compensation based on articles 4 and 25 of the Constitution.

“This is because, in these cases, the damage caused by the vaccination constitutes an excessive sacrifice for the victim (damage to health and insult to personality), for the benefit of society as a whole,” the ruling states.

Τhe court ruling came when a mother won an appeal seeking compensation after her young daughter developed a very rare side-effect to the MMR II vaccine (trivalent measles, mumps and rubella) and later died.