![\"Yates-Hazlehurst](\"http:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/Yates-Hazlehurst-trial-vaccine-injury-300x156.jpg\")
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In a riveting legal battle spanning two decades, William Yates Hazlehurst (\u201cYates\u201d) on Feb. 2, 2022, became the first vaccine-injured person with a diagnosis of autism to reach a jury since the\u00a0National Childhood Vaccine Injury Compensation Act of 1986<\/a>\u00a0(the Vaccine Act) became law.<\/p>\n In a medical malpractice case filed in the Madison County Circuit Court in Tennessee, attorneys for Yates argued the clinic and physician who administered Yates\u2019 vaccines, including the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine on Feb. 8, 2001, should be held liable for medical malpractice and the neurological injuries Yates developed after being vaccinated.<\/p>\n Although the jury decided in favor of the physician \u2014 who Yates\u2019 father said failed to adequately inform the parents of the risks of vaccinating Yates while he had an active ear infection \u2014 the case exposed major flaws in a system designed to protect children and shield pharmaceutical companies and physicians from liability for vaccine injuries.<\/p>\n \u201cIn the fight to end the autism epidemic, we were all hoping for the one knockout punch that would bring the truth to light and help end the autism epidemic,\u201d Yates\u2019 father, Rolf Hazlehurst, said.<\/p>\n \u201cThis medical malpractice trial was the only opportunity in the last 35 years for a jury to hear evidence in a court of law regarding whether a vaccine injury can cause neurological injury, including autism.\u201d<\/p>\n Hazlehurst, who is a senior staff attorney for Children\u2019s Health Defense (CHD<\/a>), said \u201cunless the Vaccine Act is repealed, my son is probably the only vaccine-injured child with a diagnosis of autism who will ever reach a jury.\u201d<\/p>\n The Hazlehurst case was a medical malpractice case against the doctor who administered the pediatric vaccines that, in the opinion of the world\u2019s top experts, sent Yates, now 22, spiraling into the depths of severe, non-verbal autism.<\/p>\n Although the case was originally filed in 2003, it didn\u2019t receive its day in court for 19 years because a separate case involving Yates\u2019 injury first had to work its way through the\u00a0National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program<\/a>\u00a0(NVICP).<\/p>\n When Yates\u2019 medical malpractice case was finally heard, the trial exposed alarming evidence about autism and vaccines, the low standard of care practiced by physicians administering pediatric vaccines and financial conflicts of interests between pharmaceutical companies that manufacture vaccines and government agencies entrusted with vaccine safety.<\/p>\n During the trial, the world\u2019s top experts in the field of autism and\u00a0mitochondrial disorder<\/a>\u00a0explained how the administration of \u201croutine\u201d childhood immunizations<\/a>\u00a0can cause autism, brain injury, and many other disorders.<\/p>\n According to the\u00a0National Institute of Mental Health<\/a>, autism is a neurological and developmental disorder that affects how people interact with others, communicate, learn and behave. Symptoms can be severe and\u00a0usually manifest<\/a>\u00a0before a child turns 3, which coincides with the age children receive the most childhood vaccines.<\/p>\n Increasing evidence indicates a\u00a0significant proportion<\/a>\u00a0of individuals with autism have concurrent diseases such as mitochondrial dysfunction, abnormalities of energy generation, gastrointestinal abnormalities and abnormalities in the regulation of the immune system.<\/p>\n Yates\u2019 medical malpractice trial illuminated how vaccines can cause autism in children with mitochondrial disorder and showed how the Vaccine Act \u2014 which is designed to ensure informed consent and compensation to injured children \u2014 is an abject failure because it\u2019s largely unenforceable.<\/p>\n