A worker at the Milwaukee Health Center “intentionally” removed 57 bottles of the Moderna coronavirus vaccine from the refrigerator and then failed to put them back, making them useless.
The employee was fired as a result of his actions, according to lawyer Aurora Health.
Over the weekend, 57 vials – or 500 doses – of the Moderna vaccine had to be discarded after the worker took the vials from a refrigerator at the Grafton clinic.
Aurora Health Care initially said it was “accidentally removed from the pharmacy refrigerator overnight,” but on Wednesday it was determined that the employee did so “intentionally” and never returned the vaccine.
Several vials of the Modern COVID-19 vaccine were taken from a refrigerator to a hospital in the Milwaukee area, causing hundreds of doses to be altered.
Wisconsin attorney Aurora Health said an employee deliberately removed more than 50 vials of vaccine to reach another object and left the vials outside without putting them back.
Aurora Health says it is still investigating the incident.
‘Earlier this week, we learned that 57 bottles of Moderna vaccine had been removed from a pharmacy refrigerator at Aurora-Grafton Medical Center overnight, resulting in more than 500 doses of the vaccine being discarded.
“We immediately launched an internal analysis and were determined to believe that this was caused by an involuntary human error. The person in question admitted today that he deliberately removed the vaccine from the refrigerator.
57 bottles of Moderna vaccine had to be discarded after worker took bottles from a refrigerator at the Aurora Medical Center clinic in Grafton
Vaccines are in limited quantities and are currently being given first to frontline health workers. Pictures, Nurse Amanda Wright, left, gives a photo with the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine to nurse Paul Smith at Augusta University in Augusta on Wednesday. morning
“We have notified the competent authorities for further investigations. We continue to believe that vaccination is our way out of the pandemic. We are more than disappointed that the actions of this individual will result in a delay of over 500 people receiving the vaccine. This was a violation of our core values, and the individual is no longer employed by us. ‘
Both federally approved vaccines – one manufactured by Moderna and the other by Pfizer – require strict cold storage conditions to maintain their effectiveness.
Vaccines are in limited quantities and are currently being given to health workers first.
The United States has administered only about 10% – less than 2.6 million – of the 20 million doses of coronavirus vaccine it has promised to administer to Americans by the end of 2020, despite having distributed more than 12 million doses of states and territories.
CDC data show that as of 9:00 a.m. Wednesday morning, less than 2.6 million people had received the first doses of Moderna or Pfizer vaccines – both difficult to transport and handle because they must be stored at freezing temperatures.
The blockade is caused by state and federal officials who failed to create plans to get those shots in the arms of Americans, according to a former FDA official who told DailyMail.com that the failure is similar to throwing the baton on the last leg of the vaccine breed.
The returns came as the US set another grim record for the deadliest day, with more than 3,900 deaths in one day – and a new mutant “super strain” of the virus was detected in southern California and Colorado.
While Americans are still waiting to be vaccinated, the UK on Wednesday authorized a vaccine by AstraZeneca that will certainly speed up the distribution of the vaccine there because it is cheaper, much easier to transport, handle and store than the Pfizer and Moderna alternatives.
However, US regulators do not intend to approve the more effective shooting until April – two months after the US study of AstraZeneca will have enough data to prove that the FDA works.
In the US, the federal government has left distribution plans almost entirely to individual states, where health departments are already under the supervision of COVID-19 cases.
As of Wednesday morning, the United States has distributed 12.4 million doses of vaccine and administered less than 2.6 million, according to CDC data updated Wednesday night.
Tom, 69, and Judy Barrett, 67, of Marco Island, Florida, are waiting in line in the early hours of Wednesday morning at the Lakes Park Regional Library in Fort Myers for the vaccine. They were waiting in line from 20:30 on Tuesday and until 6:00 on Wednesday the line stretched for the blocks
The result is a mix of state-of-the-art plans that look very different from state to state, bringing drug addicts and prisoners across the line in some places, while in others, such as Florida, older Americans camp on the lawn. stools overnight in an attempt to get vaccinated.
Others say that essential workers and the elderly are told to “call” to see if they can get a vaccine.
As anger has grown that only about 230,000 Americans get vaccinated a day, President Trump posted on Twitter on Wednesday that states have the doses and are needed to “move!”
Even Warp Speed scientist Dr. Moncef Slaoui admitted. that the launch of the US vaccine “should be better”.
Trump took to Twitter to blame states on Wednesday for the slow administration of vaccines