Vaccine Injury Stories and Medical System Challenges

We've been absolutely,

um, touched by how much these people wanna

help each other,

by how determined

they are to show up,

and this determination is because they

have not been heard. When I'm interviewing these people, I,

I ask them, every single one of them, a question that they don't expect.

I ask, "What is the most difficult part of this

experience that you've had?"

And I'm actually expecting them to say, "Well, it's becoming a, becoming a

quadriplegic. It's the chronic pain.

It's the fact that I'm on dialysis six days a week, and I'm, you

know, 33. Even if I get a transplant, that's only gonna last

10 years. I know I'm facing dialysis again." I'm

expecting that,

or the economic turmoil, or the family turmoil.

But most of them don't, don't talk about that

when I ask them what the most

difficult part is. Most of them say the most difficult part

has been dealing with the medical system.

Uh, they, almost all of them use the term gaslit.

Basically, what they have is, is they're, they're having these, these

symptoms that is causing enormous suffering,

disability, loss of function,

and they're basically being told that it's in their head or, you know, it,

it's

something else that it's not. Um, and they're actually being treated

like modern-day lepers. Um, some of them, like the doctors right out

of the gate, this is vaccine injury.

Everyone agrees it's vaccine injury, but they can't get specialists to, to

help them

because the doctor will refer to the specialist, and because the

diagnosis is vaccine injury, it's almost like there's a fear.

It's almost like they're, they're untouchable.

There's this unspeakable thing.

We cannot,

we cannot

say vaccine injury. We cannot treat vaccine injury.

They're, they're... This has become the most difficult

experience

in their lives, is dealing with the medical system,

and then also

dealing with the Vaccine Injury Support Program.

And let me just sh- share with you kind of some of the

unfairness of this program, which was actually we've learned

by all of these thousands of stories coming to us because we ask in our

questionnaire detailed questions about the Vaccine Injury

Program, and we interview these people.

And so basically, you start with a two-part process,

which is just

a form with two parts. So you fill in this form

where you basically tell your story, and you really only tell it in a couple of

paragraphs. Now, you don't know what the criteria is

because the Vaccine Injury Program doesn't say, "Here are the criteria for us to

determine what a vaccine injury is." And then you get your doctor, or a

doctor, if a doctor's willing, to fill in form two.

Many of them have not been able to apply 'cause they can't get a doctor

willing to sign the form because of this unwillingness

to participate in anything connected to vaccine injury.

Well, then they get your medical records, and internally, they, they put

together your file.

It's analyzed, or a report is done that you never see, and

then a panel of three

meet and decide things. You've never been interviewed.

So can you imagine, um, you know, one lady I was speaking

to, I think English is her s- second language.

She's largely, uh, largely quadriplegic, has some

motion in her arms, chronic pain. I'm looking at her form.

She-- It's, like, two paragraphs.

This, her life depends on this. She's hoping to get

compensation for pain and suffering.

She's hoping to get cost of living expenses.

She's hoping to get cost of care expenses.

These are people that are in absolute financial crisis.

They're depending on this program. They're never interviewed.

So if you don't tell your story right, and you're not a doctor,

you don't know what

the criteria is, you don't know what's important to them,

and

they never get back to you and say, "Well, what about this? What about this?

What about this?" And then a decision is made by three unnamed

people. You're told who, you know, oh, it's a family doctor and a

neurologist and a physiotherapist.

But you don't know who they are. You don't know if there's any bias.

You don't know if they're actually qualified to analyze your file,

and you get, you know, maybe a page and a half of reasons.

So it's a really frustrating process, and these people that are

already traumatized by the medical system report

that they're being traumatized again.

So this Allison inquiry, where the whole purpose

of this is just to listen to their stories, we've come to understand this

is so

much more important than we initially felt.

We knew that these people weren't being heard.

We knew that we start-- We have to have a, a conversation about this.

That's what we're hoping will happen with the Allison inquiry.

But we didn't understand how deeply it's needed by

these vaccine-injured persons who are literally desperate and,

you know, crowd fundraising to get

wheelchair-accessible

buses to get here. So we feel it. We're all

volunteers. We all feel very honored to be able

to assist these people, and we truly are inviting you to participate by

watching.

You know, these people are desperate to share their stories with

you, and we invite

you to participate. We guarantee it will change your lives,

as it's

changing ours, listening to their stories.