[ad_1]
Nearly 2,000 doses of Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine were spoiled at a Boston-area VA facility after a cleaning contractor accidentally loosened a cap for a freezer, according to a report.
The shots were discovered by staff at the VA Boston Pharmacy on Tuesday. At least 1,900 doses have been compromised, Kyle Toto, a spokesperson for the VA Boston Healthcare System, told the Boston Globe.
“The cap was found loose after a contractor accidentally removed it during the cleanup,” Toto said.
He added that he doesn’t think the spoiled doses will affect the rollout of the vaccine and told the newspaper that replacement doses were already being administered.
Moderna COVID-19 vaccines – as well as doses developed by rival Pfizer-BioNTech – should be stored at very low temperatures, between minus 13 and minus 5 degrees Fahrenheit. In order to maintain this temperature, the storage facilities at Jamaica Plain VA Medical Center were equipped with alarms to go off if doses got too hot or too cold, even if they did not sound when the freezer was unplugged.
Toto said he wasn’t sure why the alarm hadn’t gone off.
“An investigation is underway to determine the cause of the incident and why the monitoring and alarm system did not perform as expected,” he said.
Massachusetts has recorded a total of 462,910 coronavirus cases and 13,622 deaths from COVID-19 since the pandemic began last year, according to the State Department of Public Health.
[ad_2]
Source link