When evaluating federal initiatives, words such as “efficient,” “self-sustaining,” and “transparent” rarely come to mind. Yet, the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program bucks that trend by establishing a system that both provides a streamlined pathway to justice for vaccine victims and regulatory certainty for manufacturers.

Unfortunately, public officials such as Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. have baselessly attacked VICP as “broken” and a “morass of inefficiency, favoritism, and outright corruption.” Kennedy is determined to “fix” (read: destroy) VICP, which could create a new set of lucrative cases for trial lawyers, possibly benefiting Kennedy’s immediate family members, without any tangible benefits to actual victims. This cannot be allowed to happen.