Uruguay resumes controversial infant vaccination after Court of Appeals ruling

Uruguay will resume vaccination against Covid-19 for children under the age of 13 with the controversial mRNA injection from Pfizer after the Court of Appeals overturned a first-instance ruling in which a judge had suspended the vaccination after granting a lawyer’s appeal.

This was announced by the country’s Minister of Health, Daniel Salinas, on Tuesday on his Twitter account.

A few minutes later, Deputy Minister José Luis Satdjian announced through the same social network that vaccination of children between the ages of 5 and 13 would resume on Thursday.

(John Campbell, Ph.D.,)

In its ruling, the Court of Appeals emphasizes that the lawyer who requested the injunction “has no authority” to advance this action, “neither in his name as a lawyer and citizen nor in the representation of the diffuse interests of children under 13.”

He added that it does not seem reasonable for citizens or residents of the country to file an Amparo lawsuit, claiming to represent ‘diffuse interests’ by alleging hypothetical dangers that have not been proven.

He also points out that the behavior of health authorities “to preserve the health of residents in the area that constitutes their exclusive and sole jurisdiction is not unlawful” and that an organic system cannot interfere with the exclusive jurisdiction of another system.

No violation, restriction or threat of a right or freedom has been proven in these proceedings, since vaccination has never been mandatory, but has always been and continues to be voluntary,” he added.

On July 11, the Uruguayan government appealed the decision issued four days earlier by Judge Alejandro Recarey, who had ordered the suspension of vaccination against Covid-19 for children under 13.

The ruling ordered the suspension of vaccination “with immediate effect” until a series of requirements set by the judge are met.

A NEW STUDY RAISES QUESTIONS

A New England Journal of Medicine study involving more than a quarter million children aged 5 to 11 raises serious questions about the risk-benefit analysis for vaccinating young children, according to John Campbell, Ph.D. He reviewed the study in a recent video.

The number of severe adverse reactions to the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine was more than four times greater than the number of children needing oxygen therapy to recover from the virus, according to a study involving more than a quarter million children ages 5 to 11.

The data raise questions about the risk-benefit analysis for the vaccination against COVID-19 in children ages 5 to 11, according to John Campbell, Ph.D., a nurse teacher from the U.K. who reviewed the study in his latest video.

“Let’s hope the policymakers are completely up-to-date with this data,” said Campbell, who is described by German and British media as an expert on vaccine administration.

Based on data collected in Singapore from January 21 through April 8, when the Omicron variant was spreading rapidly, the study included 22 cases of severe adverse reactions to the Pfizer vaccine in children ages 5 to 11 and only five cases of children needing oxygen therapy.