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Christina Tarsell

HPV vaccine facts

HPV vaccine facts – refuting RFK Jr’s false and unscientific claims – Part 2

Recently,  I wrote a post about Robert F Kennedy Jr’s 25 false claims that stood against HPV vaccine facts and science – because that’s what the anti-vaccine crowd does well. 

As I mentioned, he has recently become a loudmouth anti-vaccine acolyte, who has been chastised by his own family for helping “to spread dangerous misinformation over social media and is complicit in sowing distrust of the science behind vaccines.”

Because there were 25 lies in RFK Jr’s article, I just covered the first 12 in a previous post. Now I will take on the remaining 13 by reiterating HPV vaccine facts.Read More »HPV vaccine facts – refuting RFK Jr’s false and unscientific claims – Part 2

NVICP Tarsell decision

NVICP Tarsell decision not proof of HPV vaccine-related mortality – just legal errors

On September 25, 2017, Special Master Christian Moran from the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program (NVICP), acting under a Court of Federal Claims decision that changed the legal standard for compensation, awarded compensation to Ms. Emily Tarsell for the tragic death of her daughter, Christina Tarsell. The family had blamed the tragedy on Gardasil. the HPV vaccine. Let’s review the facts and legal issues of the NVICP Tarsell decision.

A reading of the decision shows that the Special Master himself had serious doubts that the HPV vaccine had actually caused the death (and could probably have more strongly stated his doubts); however, he felt bound by a flawed decision of the Court of Federal Claims and compensated because of that guidance. The claimant’s theory that was used to claim that the vaccine caused the young woman’s death is also extremely far-fetched. It should not have fulfilled the plausible theory requirement even under the watered-down version ordered by the Federal Claims judge. The timing (i.e., cause and effect) was likely wrong – the Special Master thought the disease symptoms started before the administration of the vaccine – but for procedural reasons, he did not dwell on that issue.

While anti-vaccine websites present the Special Master’s award as proof that the death was caused by the administration of the vaccine, that is a serious misreading of the NVICP Tarsell decision. Ms. Christina Tarsell’s death is extremely tragic. But there is no good basis to claim that the HPV vaccine caused it.

There are three legal errors in the decision of the Court of Federal Claims judge, a decision that was then legally binding on the Special Master it was returned to for reconsideration:

  1. Reversing the burden of proof in relation to the timing of the alleged harm;
  2. relaxing the standard under which a medical theory is evaluated; and
  3. applying a de novo standard instead of an arbitrary and capricious standard to the Special Master’s findings of facts (which I’ll explain).

Read More »NVICP Tarsell decision not proof of HPV vaccine-related mortality – just legal errors