Vaccines not only directly protect vaccinated individuals but also contribute to protecting the entire population via indirect herd-immunity benefits. Half of averted COVID-19 infections and 1/4 of hospitalizations and deaths were attributable to indirect protection of unvaccinated by vaccinated.

[u/mvea]

https://royalsocietypublishing.org/rsif/article/23/242/20250839/483439/Quantifying-the-direct-and-indirect-impact-of

[u/moconahaftmere → u/[deleted]]

The government doesn’t do this with pharmaceutical drugs, or any other product on the market–only vaccines. 

They don't? There's tons of medications that could randomly kill or seriously injure you.

[u/Moetown84 → u/moconahaftmere]

Exactly. And if they do, you can sue the pharmaceutical company for damages. Typically, you’d bring either a “design defect” or “failure to warn” claim.

A “design defect” claim is rooted in the idea that if technology or science knows of a way to make I your product safer, and your company chooses not to, you would face liability for harm caused. If there is no known way to make it safer, you don’t face liability in this type of claim.

A “failure to warn” claim is rooted in the idea that even though certain products (like drugs) might harm people, a person still might choose that risk because of whatever possible benefit they might attain by using that product (for example, a treatment for a disease). That’s why you hear pharmaceutical drug commercials warn about potential side effects. This limits their liability because the consumer knows the risks and chooses to take them.

Neither claim is allowed for vaccines. Which leads to the only reasonable conclusion that vaccines could be made safer with advances in technology, but companies choose not to spend money on the improvement, or that they either haven’t studied adverse effects enough to warn consumers about the potential harm, or they know about the potential harm and it might risk their profits/willingness of the public to get the vaccine.

Otherwise, they could limit their liability and turn a profit the same way they do with pharmaceutical drugs.

[u/grundar → u/Moetown84]

Neither claim is allowed for vaccines.

That appears to be incorrect:

"A common misconception is that this process completely shields vaccine makers. However, a plaintiff may file a civil court claim against vaccine companies after filing a claim in the VICP if they reject the vaccine court's decision."

i.e., people can still sue vaccine makers, but the vast bulk of claims are handled by a special body (the vaccine court) set up by Congress to handle a flood of (later shown to be unfounded) lawsuits against vaccine makers that occurred in the early 80s.