VACCINE INJURY COMPENSATION MECHANISM FOR ADVERSE EVENTS CAUSED BY COVID-19 VACCINES IN SOUTHEAST ASIAN COUNTRIES

Abstract

Adverse events following immunization (AEFI) or vaccine injury is an issue of great concern in many nations, including Malaysia. This issue has long attracted the public's interest, but the emergence of COVID-19 disease has triggered greater interest as nations engaged in mass vaccination programs for their citizens. This is further exacerbated by the growing dissatisfaction with the traditional tort litigation system which necessitates exploring alternative ways to deal with vaccine injury cases. While the vaccine injury compensation program (VICP) has been implemented in several countries to compensate affected individuals following vaccination, not all VICP can cater to public health emergencies, especially regarding vaccine COVID-19. Malaysia, for example, has a similar program known as Special Financial Assistance Vaccine (SFA), which allows individuals to receive financial assistance if they suffer from AEFI COVID-19. Thus, this paper is intended to review and analyse the VICP in Southeast Asian countries and its implementation in Malaysia. This qualitative research was based on document review and comparative methodologies by exploring the VICP in Southeast Asia and similar mechanism in Malaysia to enrich the subject matter of the vaccine COVID-19 liability. The finding shows that the VICP program seems to be a great alternative in dealing with vaccine injury cases, especially in addressing the growing dissatisfaction with the traditional tort litigation system. Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand has its own VICP for affected individuals with COVID-19 vaccines while Myanmar, Cambodia, Timor-Leste, Indonesia, Vietnam, and the Philippines is under COVID-19 vaccine injury compensation scheme by COVID-19 Vaccines Global Access (COVAX) offered in 92 low- and middle-income nations.