(Eagle News)—The Palace on Saturday, March 2, welcomed a Department of Justice panel’s decision to indict former Health Secretary Janette Garin and several others, saying it only meant “the wheels of justice have begun to grind for the victims and families of children who died allegedly because of the Dengvaxia vaccine…”
According to Presidential Spokesperson Salvador Panelo, the defendants should welcome the “opportunity to clear their names and raise whatever defense they have in relation to the matter before a court of law.”
He said the Palace “will not interfere in the proceedings save for the DOJ which is mandated by law to prosecute accused felons.”
As for members of the public, he said the Palace hoped they would “finally stop politicizing the issue in the court of public opinion, noting that such exercise has only caused an unnecessary fear on the part of parents for good and creditworthy health programs of the government to the detriment of innocent children.”
“We hope that true justice and peace will be attained as this is the only way we can deliver proper closure to the victims of the vaccination initiative and their families,” he said.
Apart from Garin, other officials from the Department of Health, Food and Drug Administration, Sanofi Pasteur and the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine were indicted for reckless imprudence resulting in homicide over the dengue mass immunization program that supposedly led to the deaths of several individuals.
The DOH has said however that there was no direct link between Dengvaxia and the deaths.