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A Wisconsin hospital worker was fired and arrested after removing dozens of vials of coronavirus vaccine from a drugstore refrigerator, intentionally destroying more than 500 doses, a hospital investigation found.
The incident happened over the weekend at Aurora Medical Center in Grafton, north of Milwaukee. Grafton Police announced the pharmacist’s arrest Thursday, but did not name the man or identify a motive.
Police said in a statement they arrested the former employee on suspicion of recklessly endangering safety, adulterating a prescription drug and criminal damage to property. The damage he caused “was estimated at between $ 8,000 and $ 11,000,” police said.
Initially, it emerged that the 57 vials of the Moderna vaccine – which must be stored between 36 and 46 degrees Fahrenheit – had been left out overnight by accident, hospital officials said. Each vial contains approximately 10 doses of the vaccine.
But on Wednesday, Aurora Medical Center announced that the involved hospital worker “admitted to intentionally removing the vaccine from the refrigeration.”
“We continue to believe that vaccination is our way out of the pandemic. We are more than disappointed,” the hospital said in a statement, adding that the employee had been fired. “It was a violation of our core values.”
The Moderna vaccine has a 12 hour window after it has been thawed. Most of the vaccine doses that had been left out of the pharmacy refrigerator had to be thrown away, although hospital officials later believed they could get some back. After the hospital administered more than 50 doses of the thawed vaccines, it learned that the vaccines had in fact been thawed twice, rendering them ineffective, a hospital official said at a press conference on Thursday. The hospital said all those who received an ineffective vaccination have been informed and these people are not at risk.
The news of the spoiled vaccine doses in Wisconsin comes as the United States struggles to meet its vaccination goals. So far, only around 2.8 million people have been vaccinated, far from the 20 million expected by the Trump administration at the end of the year.
The vaccine is not yet widely available, and health workers and residents of nursing homes have priority for the first doses.
Wednesday, Advocate Aurora Health, the health system of which Aurora Medical Center is a part, said it has so far vaccinated more than 21,000 health workers.
The pharmacist is currently being held at the Ozaukee County Jail.
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