BioNTech vaccine hearing postponed after petition to change judge

[June 12, 2023]  By Nette Noestlinger

HAMBURG (Reuters) -The first hearing in a German court case against BioNTech over side effects allegedly caused by its COVID-19 vaccine was postponed on Monday after the plaintiff's lawyer petitioned for the case to be heard by different judges.The lawyer Tobias Ulbrich of law firm Rogert & Ulbrich asked for the case to be heard by a group of judges and for the currently-assigned single judge to be recused for bias, Ulbrich and a spokesperson for the regional court in Hamburg told Reuters separately.

The court in the northern city of Hamburg said a decision on the request would take a matter of days, without providing a new date for a hearing.

BioNTech could face hundreds of similar cases in the country.

It has said that the Hamburg case, brought by a woman who is seeking damages for alleged side effects including upper-body pain and fatigue, was without merit.

The logo of BioNTech is seen in Marburg, Germany, February 2, 2023. REUTERS/Fabian Bimmer/File Photo

(Reporting by Nette Noestlinger, Writing by Ludwig Burger and Anastasiia Kozlova, Editing by Rachel More and Barbara Lewis)

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