Federal Claims Research Articles

Trial for Vaccines

Parents who blame vaccines for their children's autism finally have their day in court. Congress shielded vaccine manufacturers from liability in 1986, requiring that claims be filed with the U.S. Court of Federal Claims in Washington, D.C., before a federal compensation fund pay damages. More than 4800 parents have filed claims since 1999, and the court began hearing evidence this week in a representative test case. The main focus is on a mercury-based preservative called thimerosal. Epidemiologists have found no link between autism and this ingredient, which has been phased out of almost all childhood vaccines ( Science , 12 September 2003, p. [1454][1]). “This sort of palaver has the potential to inhibit vaccination,” rues William Schaffner of Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee. A ruling could take as long as a year. [1]: /lookup/doi/10.1126/science.301.5639.1454a

Federal Court Certification of State-Law Questions: Active Judicial Federalism

Judicial federalism?the sharing of jurisdiction and interpretive authority between the state and federal courts?poses tremendous challenges to courts attempting to resolve individual disputes in an increasingly complex legal landscape. As a practical matter, state judges must regularly interpret and apply federal statutory and constitu tional law, while both supplemental and diversity jurisdiction bring state statutory, constitutional, and common-law issues to federal judges. In most cases, a judge apply ing the law of another jurisdiction can look to court decisions from that jurisdiction for guidance, but when no such guidance exists, judges are forced to put themselves in the shoes of another. State court judges are generally left to their own devices and cannot avoid inter preting federal laws, even when doing so presents a matter of first impression. Federal court judges, on the other hand, have a number of weapons in their arsenal that let them avoid prediction of unsettled state-law questions. First, under certain circum stances, a federal court exercising federal-question jurisdiction may decline to exer cise supplemental jurisdiction over state-law claims, thus forcing the parties to litigate their dispute in both state and federal court. Second, under relatively rare circumstances, a federal court may invoke the abstention mechanism first described by the Supreme Court in Railroad Commission of Texas v. Pullman Co. (1941). Specifically, Pullman abstention is appropriate when resolution of a state-law question may eliminate the need for a federal court to address a federal constitutional question. When Pullman abstention is properly invoked, the federal court stays further proceedings on the case before it while the parties file a declaratory judgment action in state court; the federal court retains jurisdiction over the federal claims but stays its hand until the state-law question wends its way through the entire state court process. Finally, federal court judges may retain jurisdiction over all claims, state and federal, and bypass the unwieldy Pullman process by going straight to those responsi ble for declaring state law: federal judges may certify novel questions of state law directly to the state s highest court. Federal courts have been quick to point out this particular advantage of certification in Pullman abstention cases like Be?lotti v. Baird (1976) and Gnffin Hospital v. The Commission on Hospitals and Healthcare (1986). Forty-seven states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico have some provision of state law, in either a statute or a court rule, that allows the highest court in the state to answer legal questions certified by federal courts. At first blush, the procedure appears to be the ultimate act of deference to the sovereignty of states and the sanctity of state law. As one commentator remarked, "[T]he availability of certification produces a weird sort of security patrol in which federal courts surveil the border between the [state and federal] systems and from time to time repel their own attempts to invade the province of state law" (Selya,

Tenure is justifiable

The target article by Ceci et al. provides some interesting results regarding how faculty might react to difficult social dilemmas, but it has little to say about tenure and its effect upon academic freedom. This comment discusses briefly what we know about tenure, and employment protection more generally, and why it may be in a university's best interest to hire tenured faculty. The comment concludes by pointing out that the results make a rather useful contribution regarding the difficulty of eliciting information on malfeasance in organizations, an area of enormous importance. For example, the results may help us understand why the government has introduced rewards for the reporting of fraud under the whistle-blowing provisions of the Federal Claims Act.

Assessing Gaps Between Policy and Practice in Medicaid Disenrollment of Jail Detainees With Severe Mental Illness

Assessing Gaps Between Policy and Practice in Medicaid Disenrollment of Jail Detainees With Severe Mental Illness

Appeals Court Rejects Federal Jurisdiction over Chiropractors Challenge to Medicare Coverage – Am. Chiropractic Ass'n, Inc. v. Leavitt

The United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit (“Appeals Court”) held that the district court did not have jurisdiction over the American Chiropractor's Association's (“ACA”) federal question claims brought under the Medicare Act, despite affirming the ACA's prudential standing to pursue its claims. The Appeals Court reversed the lower court's decision allowing a doctor of medicine or osteopathy to perform manual manipulations of the spine on Medicare beneficiaries to correct a subluxation.The Medicare program “subsidizes medical insurance for elderly and disabled persons.” An enrollee selects a physician or obtains medical services through a managed-care provider, such as a health maintenance organization (“HMO”).

The Supreme Court Says Rules Are Rules: Ballard v. Commissioner of Internal Revenue

ll courts issue rules of procedure that instruct prospective litigants in every phase of a case, from the initial filing through discovery and trial to the decision, and even what will be included in the record on appeal. In the recent case of Ballard v. Commissioner of Internal Revenue, 125 S.Ct. 1270 (2005), by a 7-2 vote, with an opinion by Justice Ginsburg, the United States Supreme Court upheld the perhaps novel concept that courts, in this case the United States Tax Court, must follow, and adhere to, their own promulgated rules. The United States Tax Court has a powerful influence on tax policy; it is one of three forums, along with the United States District Court and the United States Court of Federal Claims, where taxpayers may contest an assessment by the Internal Revenue Service. Because no prepayment of the assessment is required for someone to proceed in the tax court, significantly more cases are filed there than in either of the other courts. The tax court consists of nineteen full-time judges, appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate, for a fixed term of fifteen years. The chief judge of the tax court has the authority to appoint special judges to deal with any matter pending before the tax court “in accordance with these Rules and such directions as may be prescribed by the Chief Judge” (Tax Court Rule 180). In cases involving assessments exceeding $50,000, the special judge tries the case and then submits a report to a regular tax court judge, who has the authority to adopt the special trial judge’s report, or the tax court judge may “modify it or may reject it in whole or in part,” with “due regard given to the circumstance that the Special Trial Judge had the opportunity to evaluate the credibility of witnesses, and the findings of fact recommended by the Special Trial Judge shall be presumed to be correct” (Tax Court Rule 183 (c)). The final opinion issued by the regular tax court judge is a collaborative second report, which is “agreed to and adopted” as the opinion of the tax court. Through the year 1983, a report by a special judge was made public and was included in the record on appeal. This allowed litigants to see why and how the regular judge’s ruling may have differed from that initial opinion. Since 1983, however, the special judge’s opinion has been withheld from the litigants, and the public, and excluded from the record on appeal. Although the regular tax court judge overseeing A

‘Ungodly’ Agency Shop Fees Revisited

ON 26 September 2001, the Chino Valley School District, which is approximately 30 miles east of Los Angeles, signed a negotiated agreement with the duly authorized union representing the certified employees, the Associated Chino Teachers (ACT). The agreement provided that every member of the represented unit would become either a member of the ACT or an agency fee payer. The agency fee is that portion of the membership dues that is used for representation. Per the agreement, each year the ACT must notify the agency fee payers of the amount and types of its expenditures and of their to object to the fee or to challenge its calculation. In line with the California Education Employment Relations Act, which gives agency fee payers the to receive upon request a rebate or reduction of that portion of their fee not devoted to the cost of negotiations, contract administration, and other representational activities, the agreement requires that if an agency fee payer objects to money being spent on items not germane to ACT's representational activities, the fee is reduced by the percentage expended on such items plus a 5% cushion. Such objections may be based on political or ideological convictions. A separate exception for complete who object on religious grounds to supporting ACT in any way -- not just for identified nonrepresentational items -- provides that they may opt to donate an amount equal to the agency fee to a charitable organization. For the 2002-03 school year, ACT's membership dues were $782. For objectors, the agency fee was $485. Of the 1,550 represented employees, 54 opted to be agency fee payers. Of those 54, 36 paid a fee of $782 and 18 submitted objections, resulting in the reduced fee of $485. On 15 August 2002, Barbara Madsen, a Chino Valley teacher who had applied for and received objector status, wrote a letter to the president of the ACT requesting to pay the reduced, not the full, agency fee to a charity of her choice. On 27 August, the ACT president denied her request, explaining that religious objectors must pay $782, not $485. She did so, contributing the higher amount to the American Cancer Society, following up in October with a complaint to the federal Equal Employment Opportunities Commission. The EEOC is the agency that administers Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, which prohibits discrimination based on religion and certain other protected categories. On 7 November 2002, the EEOC issued her a right to sue letter. On 24 April 2003, Madsen filed suit in California Superior Court, claiming violations of Title VII, the 14th Amendment's equal protection clause, and the First Amendment's establishment clause in addition to parallel state claims. Based on the federal claims, the ACT succeeded in removing the case to federal court. On 19 April 2004, the federal district court issued its decision, granting a summary judgment (that is, a decision without a trial because of the lack of any significant factual dispute) to the ACT.1 As for Title VII, the court presented three reasons for rejecting Madsen's argument that the ACT punishes religious objectors while pocketing the difference between their fees and other objectors' fees. First, her argument disregarded the purpose of the agency fee provision of the state's Education Employment Relations Act, which is to counteract the incentive for represented employees to become free riders. Second, the court concluded that, inasmuch as Madsen acknowledged that she was not similarly situated to agency fee payers, ACT appropriately minimized the burden on its membership by recognizing the distinction. The court reasoned: Because religious objectors cannot be required to pay any money to ACT, the only way to treat agency fee payers and religious objectors identically would be to excuse all objectors from paying ACT and allow them to pay a charity. …

Article I Tribunals, Article III Courts, and the Judicial Power of the United States

TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION I. LEADING ACCOUNTS OF ARTICLE III A. Problems with the Literal Account 1. Legislative Courts 2. Administrative Agencies 3. Executive Branch Administration of Laws B. The Court's Alternatives to Article III Literalism 1. Holding the Line with Categorical Constraints 2. Balancing Article III Values C. Scholarly Alternatives to Article III Literalism II. THE TEXTUAL FOUNDATION OF AN INFERIOR TRIBUNALS ACCOUNT A. Distinguishing Inferior Tribunals from Inferior Courts 1. Textual and Structural Support 2. Support in the Drafting History 3. Early Implementation B. Inferiority in Relation to a Unitary Supreme Court III. THE ELEMENTS OF AN INFERIOR TRIBUNALS ACCOUNT: LESSONS FROM INSTITUTIONAL HISTORY A. Inferior Tribunals for Matters Outside the Judicial Power 1. The Finality Principle (a) Finality and Public Benefit Claims (b) Finality and Advisory Opinions 2. Territorial Courts and the Absence of Federal Rights 3. The Traditional Boundaries Principle (a) Court-Martial Proceedings (b) Small Claims, Bankruptcy, and Mixed Functions B. Preserving the Inferiority of Article I Tribunals 1. Direct Appellate Review 2. Supervisory Power and the Common Law Writs 3. Common Law Collateral Attacks on Inferior Tribunals C. Murray's Lessee, Public Rights, and the Limits of Congressional Power 1. Murray's Lessee and Public Rights 2. The Curious Focus on Issues of State Law D. Public Benefits, Private Rights, and Administrative Agencies E. The Scope of Review Required by the Principle of Inferiority IV. APPLYING THE INFERIOR TRIBUNALS ACCOUNT A. Testing the Inferiority of Familiar Article I Tribunals 1. Territorial Courts 2. Courts-Martial 3. Military Commissions 4. Public Rights, Sovereign Immunity, and the Court of Federal Claims 5. Article I Judges in Article III Courts 6. Magistrate Judges 7. NAFTA and the Use of International Panels To Arbitrate Trade Disputes B. Applying the Inferiority Principle to Leading Cases 1. Northern Pipeline 2. CFTC v. Schor 3. Thomas v. Union Carbide 4. Article I Appellate Review CONCLUSION We lack an entirely convincing account of the scope of Congress's power under the Constitution to create Article I and invest them with authority to adjudicate disputes that seemingly come within the scope of Article III. The literal terms of Article III appear to rule out reliance upon Article I altogether; Article III vests the judicial power of the United States in federal whose judges enjoy salary and tenure protections that were designed to ensure judicial independence in a scheme of separated powers. Yet Article I have grown up and flourished throughout the nation's history. This institutional history of Article I adjudication demonstrates the need for an alternative to literalism, but none of the competitors resolves the problem. The balancing test currently preferred by the Supreme Court acknowledges some role for Article I but fails to provide clear guidelines as to when Congress may sidestep Article III. A more promising academic theory--the appellate review account--emphasizes the need for appellate review in constitutional as the key to legitimate Article I adjudication. While this theory offers greater coherence, it does not fit especially well with some features of our institutional history and it would seemingly authorize some arrangements that depart dramatically from current law. Professor Pfander develops a new inferior tribunals account. Building on the constitutional distinction between inferior tribunals (in Article I) and inferior courts (in Article III), he suggests a new textual foundation for Article I tribunals. …

US Tax Scene: US Court of Federal Claims Issues Ruling in National Westminster Bank

US Tax Scene: US Court of Federal Claims Issues Ruling in <i>National Westminster Bank</i>

The Judicial Bookshelf

The Judicial Bookshelf D. GRIER STEPHENSON, JR. Standard nomenclature in Supreme Court literature contrasts the “old Court” and the “new Court” (or, sometimes, the “modern Court”). By most accounts, the dividing line between the two falls during the years 1937-1940, when the nation witnessed a judicial and constitutional revolution. The proverbial “irresistible force” (in the form ofPresident Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal program to cope with the Great Depression) met the “immovable object” (in the guise ofthe Supreme Court under the leadership ofChiefJustice Charles Evans Hughes that, for a short time, stymied many ofthe President’s initiatives). The result was Roosevelt’s audacious assault on the Court through the Court-packing plan and the hasty change of mind by Hughes and Justice Owen J. Roberts that gave Roosevelt the five sure votes he needed so that his agenda could receive the constitutional stamp ofapproval. This flip-flop was promptly followed by the Court’s adoption of a new agenda for itself, one that elevated civil liberties into a preferred position in the hierarchy of constitutional values and demoted property interests, which heretofore had been accorded heightened judicial protection. To be sure, the categories of old Court and new Court, as they are usually understood, are helpful in understanding a pivotal period in Supreme Court history. Yet they may ob­ scure as much as they reveal in grasping fun­ damental changes in the Court’s development across more than two centuries. For this task, perhaps the nomenclature of“classical Court” and “modern Court” (albeit with the “new” or post-1937 Court being a subset ofthe latter) is more appropriate. Compared to the relatively sudden transformationafter 1937, however, the shift from classical to modern Court occurred gradually during roughly the last thirty years of the nineteenth century. That would include the last three years of the Chase Court (18641873 ), all of Morrison Waite’s Chief Justice­ ship (1874-1888), and the first twelve years of the Fuller Court (1888-1910). The era ofthe classical Court was marked by (1) an exceedingly limited federal jurisdic­ tion, (2) a structure thatmade the Benchmainly a court oferrors, not a court oflegal policy, and (3) onerous circuit-riding duties. Those famil­ iarwiththehistory offederaljurisdictionknow that the great bulk of litigation in the federal courts until after the Civil War consisted of admiralty and diversity cases. The latter posed THE JUDICIAL BOOKSHELF 371 questions that would have been heard by state courts except for the fact that the parties were citizens of more than one state and because the dollar amount at issue met a threshold set by Congress. The relatively small number of cases in the Supreme Court that raised federal constitutional questions usually came from the highest court of a state; under section 25 of the Judiciary Act of 1789, these qualified for Supreme Court review only if the court below had ruled against the federal claim. Moreover, except for admiralty and a handful of other cases, the Supreme Court was the sole tribunal in existence to hear ap­ peals within the federal judicial system (the circuit courts were principally trial, not appel­ late, bodies). There was no intermediate appel­ late bench between the circuit courts and the Supreme Court. Thus, much of the Justices’ energy was expended reviewing trial-court de­ cisions, regardless of their importance. Every case in federal court, it seemed, had an equal claim on the Supreme Court’s time, unless it was a criminal case.1 The burden of review by right of an everexpanding number ofcircuit-court rulings was compounded by the system ofjudicial staffing that Congress had decreed in 1789. There were three types of federal courts (district, circuit, and Supreme Court), but only two types of federal judges (district judges and Supreme Court Justices). A circuit court for a district was staffed by the local district judge and, af­ ter 1793,2 a Supreme Court Justice assigned to that circuit. Except for a brief period in 1801 when Congress created separate circuit judgeships (before a new Congress repealed that measure in 1802) and a distance-driven creation of a circuit judgeship for California in 1855, there were no distinct circuit judges until 1869, when Congress also reduced...

The Future: Scrutinizing The Empirical Case For the Court of Federal Claims

The 20th anniversary of the Federal Courts Improvement Act (FCIA) presents an opportunity to reflect upon the unique role of the United States Court of Federal Claims (COFC). The COFC has evolved into a jurisdictional catch-all, rather than a forum that serves a needed purpose. Although public contracts dominate the Court of Federal Claims' docket, the Court plays only a minor role in the field, and mere election of fora does not justify the Court's participation. Hence, this paper offers three reasons to challenge the viability of the Court's current mandate: (1) the Court is not a specialized court; (2) dispersal of the Court's docket would not unduly burden any receiving fora; and (3) because most of the Court's jurisdiction is concurrent and because (empirically) the Court is not the forum of choice, the benefits of forum election are illusory. Ultimately, the paper makes the empirical case that eliminating the Court could enhance efficiency and consistency, while reducing confusion in law and practice.

The Provenance of the Federal Courts Improvement Act of 1982

This paper is being prepared for a symposium sponsored by the Court of Federal Claims to recognize the twentieth anniversary of the Federal Courts Improvement Act of 1982 (FCIA). The paper describes the history and purposes of the FCIA and assesses whether those purposes have been met. The paper concludes that, overall, the FCIA has achieved its purposes. In addition to making that assessment, the paper uses the FCIA's history to discuss the conditions necessary for successful enactment of judicial reform legislation. The paper also discusses the directions that future judicial reform might take in order to build on the FCIA's success.

Tahoe-Sierra Preservation Council v. Tahoe Regional Planning Agency: About More Than Moratoria

Abstract In the June 2002 issue, we were pleased to feature commentaries from nine distinguished land-use attorneys on the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Tahoe-Sierra Preservation Council v. Tahoe Regional Planning Agency (122 S. Ct. 1465). The opinion has already had a swift and substantial impact, providing grist for continuing education programs, conferences, law review articles and, as of late September, cited in five federal district courts, in four federal courts of appeals, the federal claims court, the Supreme Courts of Alaska, Idaho, Kansas, Pennsylvania, and South Dakota, as well as the Courts of Appeals in Ohio, Texas, and Washington. [See, eg., Barefoot v. City of Wilmington, 37 Fed. Appx. 626 (U.S. App., 4th Cir.) (Decided June 10, 2002); Ken Leahy Constr. v. City of Gladstone, 36 Fed. Appx. 311 (U.S. App., 9th Cir.) (Decided June 4, 2002); Boise Cascade Corp. v. United States, 296 F.3d 1339 (U.S. App., Fed. Cir.) (Decided July 19, 2002); Conti v. United States, 291 F.3d 1334 (U.S. App., Fe...

Federal Regulation of State Court Procedures

May Congress regulate the procedures by which state courts adjudicate claims arising under state law? Recently, Congress not only has considered several bills that would do so, but has enacted a few of them. This Article concludes that such laws exceed Congress's constitutional authority. There are serious questions as to whether a regulation of court procedures qualifies as a regulation of interstate commerce under the Commerce Clause. Even assuming, however, that it does qualify as such, the Tenth Amendment reserves the power to regulate court procedures to the states. Members of the Founding generation used conflict-of-laws language to describe a state court's obligation to enforce federal law: A state court enforces federal law as it would the law of a foreign sovereign. Under traditional conflicts principles that precede the Founding of the Union, a forum state has exclusive authority to regulate the procedures by which its courts enforce rights of action before it. It is true that the Supreme Court's doctrine regarding whether state courts must enforce federal claims rejects the conflicts paradigm. But it is equally true that its doctrine regarding the procedures by which state courts enforce federal claims embraces the conflicts paradigm. Applying traditional conflicts principles governing matters of procedure, Congress has no authority to regulate the procedures by which state courts adjudicate state law claims. This understanding of the Constitution has prudential value. Injecting isolated federal rules of procedural into fifty cohesive state procedural codes could create myriad procedural and substantive anomalies. Exclusive state control of state court enforcement of state law rights also serves the traditional normative values of federalism.

Sovereign Immunity and Intellectual Property

Should states have constitutional sovereign immunity in copyright and patent lawsuits? In Florida Prepaid, the Court said the answer is yes, but many have argued that this is (even setting aside the various textual, originalist, or precedential arguments) just plain silly. A simple analogy, critics suggest, proves this: Why should government-run UCLA be treated differently from privately-run USC? This short (8-page) article points to two alternative analogies that suggest sovereign immunity in such cases may not be so odd or unjust after all. First, why should state-run UCLA be treated differently from the federally-run Department of Defense? The federal government has long asserted its sovereign immunity in copyright and patent cases, subject only to a Takings-Clause-based lawsuit for just compensation in the Court of Federal Claims. This, as it happens, is pretty close to what is left after Florida Prepaid for state infringements. Second, why should state infringements of intellectual property be treated differently from state infringements of real or personal property? Governments routinely interfere with private property rights, subject only to a Takings-Clause-based lawsuit for just compensation; and intellectual property hawks often argue that intellectual property rights should be entitled to the same respect as other property rights are. And Florida Prepaid leaves intellectual property owners in pretty much the same situation as other property owners. The article concludes that state sovereign immunity might or might not be constitutionally mandated or wise -- but that simple analogies between state government infringements and private infringements can't go far to resolve this matter.

Waiving States' Sovereign Immunity from Suit in Their Own Courts: Purchased Waiver and the Clear Statement Rule

In recent years, the Supreme Court has expanded the Eleventh Amendment concept of state sovereign immunity to limit the extent to which individual litigants may assert federal rights against states in federal court. In its 1998 term, the Supreme Court extended the sovereign immunity doctrine to shield states from federal claims asserted by individuals in state courts as well. While the Court has carved out exceptions to the sovereign immunity doctrine, it has consistently held that if Congress wishes to make states liable in federal court through one of those exceptions, it must do so by clearly expressing its intent to abrogate states' sovereign immunity. This Note focuses on one of the exceptions to sovereign immunity-the constructive waiver of sovereign immunity that sometimes occurs when states accept federal funds-and argues that the clear statement requirement should not be applied to federal funding legislation that seeks to provide individual claimants a right to sue their state in state court.

The Fallout from Federal Low‐Income Housing Preservation Programs: A Case Study in Estimating Damages

In 1987, Congress passed the Emergency Low‐Income Housing Preservation Act (ELIHPA) to prevent owners of low‐income housing projects from converting their properties to market rents as allowed under the owners’ original government‐insured mortgage contracts. Three years later, ELIHPA was replaced by the Low‐Income Housing Preservation and Resident Homeownership Act (LIHPRHA), which imposed permanent restrictions on property owners’ rights to prepay their mortgages. The compensation to owners under ELIHPA and LIHPRHA did not cover their losses during the prepayment freeze and led to a series of lawsuits. This article presents the methodology for evaluating owners’ losses that was accepted by the U.S. Court of Federal Claims. If the court's decision is ultimately sustained on appeal, American taxpayers may face a damage bill on the order of $500 million or more. The real long‐term damage, however, lies in how the private sector will react to future attempts by the government to produce low‐income housing.

Using state and federal claims data to evaluate the patterns and costs of cancer care.

Not very long ago, the only codified data that resulted from a clinical encounter was a bill. The remainder of the transaction between a doctor and patient was a typed or handwritten note filed away until the next visit. Burrowing into the files to retrieve enough clinical data to permit a sophisticated outcomes analysis cost considerable time and energy relegating most of these efforts to research centers. Furthermore, the only routine reports at the population level were incidence and mortality data.

National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act: Revision of the Vaccine Injury Table

The National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act of 1986 (the Act) established the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program (VICP) as a federal "no-fault" compensation system for individuals who may have been injured by specific covered vaccines. Entering its ninth year of operation, the VICP has ensured childhood vaccine supplies by dramatically reducing vaccine companies' and providers' liability that threatened the production of vaccines during the 1980s. The VICP has received 5057 petitions filed for possible injury from vaccines covered under the VICP, including 4240 filed for vaccines administered before October 1988, and 817 for vaccines administered between October 1988 and August 1996. Over 3700 claims have been adjudicated, 985 of which have been found to be compensable, and the remainder have been dismissed. The Vaccine Injury Table (the Table) lists specific injuries or conditions and timeframes after vaccination that may be compensated under the VICP. The Table establishes legal presumptions about causation, which are used by the US Court of Federal Claims (the Court) to adjudicate petitions. The VICP covers seven "childhood" vaccines: diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus, measles, mumps, rubella, and polio. Effective March 10, 1995, the Table was revised to better reflect current scientific knowledge about vaccine injuries (Table 1). As part of the Act, Congress mandated a review of the scientific literature and other information on specific adverse consequences of pertussis and rubella vaccines. The Institute of Medicine (IOM) performed and published a report of this review in 1991, and a review of a follow-up study of the National Childhood Encephalopathy Study in 1994.

Chronic arthropathy and musculoskeletal symptoms associated with rubella vaccines. A review of 124 claims submitted to the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program.

To report the outcome of 124 claims of chronic arthropathy associated with rubella vaccine submitted to the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program. Medical records and testimony were reviewed separately by physicians and Special Masters to determine the clinical diagnosis and eligibility for compensation under the Program. Among the 124 subjects with chronic arthropathy, the onset occurred between 1 week and 6 weeks after the rubella vaccination in 72, and < 1 week or > 6 weeks after the vaccination in 52. Various conditions developed in the 2 onset groups (1-6 weeks postvaccination, < 1 week or > 6 weeks postvaccination), including, respectively, unspecified arthritis (n = 29, n = 1), specified arthritis (n = 11, n = 19), arthralgia (n = 24, n = 7), fibromyalgia (n = 4, n = 11), and multiple symptoms with minimal arthralgia or myalgia (n = 4, n = 14). Concordance of medical recommendations by Program physicians and Special Masters' decisions in 56 completed claims was 91%, with awards mainly to patients with chronic unspecified arthritis and arthralgia. The Program and the US Court of Federal Claims have accepted a causal relationship between currently used rubella vaccine in the US and some chronic arthropathy with an onset between 1 week and 6 weeks after vaccine administration.