MANILA, Philippines — The Department of Justice (DOJ) has withdrawn the charges filed against former Department of Health secretary and now Iloilo First District Rep. Janette Garin as well as two other former DOH officials over the controversial Dengvaxia anti-dengue vaccine.
In a Jan. 10 resolution, Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin Remulla directed the prosecutor general to “withdraw the information for reckless imprudence resulting in homicide, if any, filed against respondent-appellant Dr. Janette Garin, Dr. Gerado V. Bayugo and Dr. Ma. Joyce U. Ducusin.”
Bayugo was a former DOH undersecretary, while Ducusin, a former assistant secretary, headed the DOH Family Health Office. Ducusin is currently a division chief at the Philippine National AIDS Council. The three were facing 98 counts of reckless imprudence resulting in homicide charges.
“After a careful examination of the evidence on the records of these cases, we do not find a prima facie case with reasonable certainty of conviction against respondents-appellants Bayugo, Ducusin and Garin,” Remulla said.
He added that despite the voluminous evidence submitted by the complainant-appellees, “it cannot be established that there is any causal link between Dengvaxia vaccination and the deaths alleged in the complaint-affidavits.”
The DOJ chief also pointed out that even the World Health Organization had reportedly given information that as to the temporal association of the administration of the Dengvaxia vaccine, vaccine-related viscerotropic or neurotropic disease should manifest within eight days from vaccination.
But in this case, a perusal of the dates showed that the symptoms manifested beyond the eight-day period from the last day of vaccination, Remulla added.
“Since it appears that viscerotropism and neurotropism cannot be determined via an autopsy, little to no probative value should be attributed to the PAO (Public Attorney’s Office) forensic reports,” Remulla said, citing physician Dr. Scott Halstead’s testimony during a Senate Blue Ribbon committee hearing.
He also pointed out that Garin left the DOH on June 30, 2016. The inoculation of the children took place between April 2016 and February 2019 and the dates of their deaths were between December 2016 and November 2020.
He added the complaints were “based on self-serving hearsay and unreliable evidence. The allegations in their complaints are not based on the complainant’s personal knowledge but rather on the statements made during the joint hearings of the Senate Blue Ribbon committee (and) the committees on health and demography and finance.”
The health workers also reportedly first secured consent from the students and conducted a health assessment of each before proceeding with the vaccination. The Food and Drug Administration also issued a Certificate of Product Registration for the Dengvaxia vaccine which is manufactured by Sanofi Pasteur.
The complainants-appellees also reportedly failed to prove that the respondents-appellants and other respondents did not inquire about the children’s health conditions and pre-existing comorbidities.
Remulla noted that Garin was not responsible for the actual injection even if she was once the DOH secretary. “There is no law that penalizes command responsibility… There is no crime if there is no law punishing it,” he said.
“In the scheme of things that transpired involving Dengvaxia, we found that the step-by-step procedures undertaken by the respondents-appellants, leading to the implementation of the program, do not exhibit inexcusable lack of precaution to hold them liable for reckless imprudence resulting to homicide,” he explained.