39 detained in nationwide vaccines scandal
Print Edition
POLICE in east China’s Shandong Province said yesterday that they are holding at least 37 people in connection with a nationwide vaccines scandal.
The detentions follow publication of a list of 300 people believed to be involved in the 570 million yuan (US$88 million) operation.
Earlier in the day authorities said Huang Zengcai had been caught in the southern city of Shenzhen while another suspect, who was not named, was apprehended in Changsha, capital of central China’s Hunan Province, according to a report by China Central Television.
Earlier this week, police in Shandong had said that a 47-year-old former doctor, surnamed Pang, and her daughter, Sun, were being held on charges of illegal sales of vaccines to nationwide distributors.
Police said Pang had been sentenced to three years in prison for illegally selling vaccines in 2009 but was given a five-year reprieve.
Shandong’s food and drug watchdog has dispatched nine inspection teams to help the police investigation, checking 2,276 manufacturers and medical facilites, or about 70 percent of the total in the province.
An initial investigation found that nine pharmaceutical wholesalers had fabricated distribution channels and they will be held primarily responsible for the illegal circulation of the vaccines, CCTV said, citing the China Food and Drug Administration.
Three of the companies are based in Shandong, two in northwest China’s Shaanxi Province, while the others are in Hebei, Henan, Hunan and Jilin provinces, CCTV reported.
They include Hebei Weifang Biological Production Supply Center, affiliated to Hebei Disease Control and Prevention Center, and Shandong Shijie Biological Pharmaceutical Co Ltd, which is listed on China’s “New Third Board,” the National Equities Exchange and Quotations.
Another company named, the Shandong Zhaoxin Biological Technology Co Ltd, had its license revoked yesterday after investigators in the six provinces were urged to check possible violations and report their findings by March 25.
The network was trading vaccines that were neither refrigerated nor transported properly, police said, conditions which may have rendered them useless or capable of causing harmful side effects.
Police said the case involved 12 vaccines, including those for hepatitis B, rabies, mumps and Japanese encephalitis, two immune globulin and one therapeutic product.
The Supreme People’s Procuratorate has said it will directly oversee the case and urged prosecuting bodies at all levels to spare no efforts in their investigation.
Prosecutors across the country will work closely with local police and drug administration to uncover the manufacturing source, circulation channels and buyers of the inferior products, it said.
The SPP also ordered a rapid response mechanism to be established to facilitate information sharing.
Meanwhile, the World Health Organization’s office in China moved to reassure the public that improperly stored or expired vaccines posed a “very small” risk of causing a toxic reaction.
It said the WHO was aware of the vaccines case and was awaiting the results of the investigation by China’s health authority. The organization also expressed willingness to provide support.
The WHO said vaccines used in China had proved to be safe and effective, having eliminated polio and neonatal tetanus and reduced preventable diseases to very low levels in China.
It encouraged parents to continue to protect their children’s health through vaccination.
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