[4] The program is an outgrowth of the 1986 National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act (NCVIA), which requires health care providers to report: VAERS was established in 1990 and is managed jointly by the FDA and the CDC.
[5] It is meant to act as a sort of "early warning system"[6]—a way for physicians and researchers to identify possible unforeseen reactions or side effects of vaccination for further study.
[12] The study's lead author stated: "Lawyers are manipulating this system to show increases [in vaccine-related adverse events] that are based on litigation, not health research.
"[13] Paul Offit, chief of infectious disease at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, wrote: Public health officials were disappointed to learn that reports of autism to VAERS weren't coming from parents, doctors, nurses, or nurse practitioners; they were coming from personal-injury lawyers ... For the lawyers, VAERS reports hadn't been a self-fulfilling prophecy; they'd been a self-generated prophecy.
[14] Due to the program's open and accessible design and its allowance of unverified reports, incomplete VAERS data is often used in false claims regarding vaccine safety.