SEOUL, Oct. 14 (Korea Bizwire) — A South Korean court has ruled that the death of a 22-year-old man following a COVID-19 vaccination was causally linked to the shot, marking a rare judicial recognition of vaccine-related death in the country.
According to a ruling by the Seoul Administrative Court, the man, identified only as A, received a Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine on August 17, 2021, and suffered a brain hemorrhage five days later. Despite undergoing emergency surgery, he never regained consciousness and died a month later, on September 18.
The victim’s parents applied for state compensation under the Infectious Disease Prevention Act, but the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) denied the claim in June 2023, arguing that the case did not match any recognized adverse reactions and that “temporal causality” between vaccination and death was weak. The family’s appeal was also dismissed, prompting them to file suit.
The court’s 14th administrative division, presided over by Judge Lee Sang-deok, sided with the family, ruling that the KDCA’s refusal of compensation was unlawful. “Given the timing and the lack of any preexisting conditions, it is reasonable to infer that the vaccine caused the death,” the court stated.
The ruling noted that the man had no prior history of brain disease or vascular issues and that his symptoms appeared within a short period after vaccination. Medical experts consulted during the case testified that while a definitive causal link was difficult to prove, “it cannot be ruled out that physiological changes from vaccination contributed to the fatal hemorrhage.”
The court emphasized that due to the rapid development of COVID-19 vaccines, the full scope of potential adverse effects remains unclear, and cases of post-vaccination cerebral hemorrhage have been reported in medical literature. It concluded that the absence of brain hemorrhage from the official list of recognized side effects was insufficient grounds to deny causation.
The KDCA did not appeal, making the ruling final.
The decision could influence future vaccine compensation cases in South Korea, where the government’s threshold for recognizing vaccine-related deaths has been a source of ongoing public and political debate.
Jerry M. Kim (jerry_kim@koreabizwire.com)
