"British Firm to Compensate Two French Multiple Sclerosis
Victims"
Agence France Presse (www.afp.com) (05/03/01)
A French court has upheld a lower court ruling that found a link between GlaxoSmithKline's
hepatitis B vaccine and multiple sclerosis (MS) and has ordered the company to pay two
women who contracted MS after receiving the vaccine an as-yet undetermined amount of
compensation. The ruling is important, because it rejected arguments that a direct
and irrefutable link between the vaccine and MS is needed, said Gisele Mor, the
plaintiffs' attorney. "It ruled that barring scientific evidence, serious,
precise, and similar evidence was enough proof," Mor noted.