Vaccine injury claims could face bureaucratic ‘black hole’

Lost in the U.S. launch of the coronavirus vaccine is a fact most don’t know when they roll up their sleeves: In rare cases of serious illness from the shots, the injured are blocked from suing and steered instead to an obscure federal bureaucracy with a record of seldom paying claims.

Housed in a nondescript building in a Washington, D.C., suburb, the Countermeasures Injury Compensation Program has just four employees and few hallmarks of an ordinary court. Decisions are made in secret by government officials, claimants can’t appeal to a judge and payments in most death cases are capped at $370,376.

George Washington University law professor Peter Meyers has followed the program for years and bluntly calls it a “black hole,” obtaining federal documents this summer showing it has paid fewer than 1 in 10 claims in its 15-year history.

Vaccines historically provide broad protection with little risk but come with side effects just as any other drugs. Few unexpected adverse effects have been reported in the early days of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine distribution in the U.S., though an Alaska health worker suffered a severe allergic reaction that included shortness of breath.

But experts are concerned that with the sheer volume of people expected to get coronavirus vaccines in the U.S. — more than 200 million — even a successful rollout with relatively few ill effects could be enough to swamp the program.

“It would need to be ramped up for sure,” said Dr. Vito Caserta, who oversaw the countermeasures program from its creation until his retirement in 2014. “They may get overwhelmed very, very quickly.”

Asked about that possibility, David Bowman, a spokesman for the Health Resources and Services Administration that oversees the program, said it is “planning to process the potential influx of COVID-19...