Lahore: 550 doses of COVID-19 vaccine go missing from one hospital, 350 spoiled at another

Around 550 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine have reportedly gone missing from Lahore’s Services Hospital, media reports have claimed citing sources at the health department.

According to the reports, an additional 350 doses of coronavirus vaccines stored at the city’s Government Mozang Teaching Hospital have “gone to waste”, while no record could be found for the nearly 600 missing ones.

The missing vaccines have been administered to important personalities, bureaucrats, and their friends, sources at the health department said, adding that Federal Minister for Housing Tariq Bashir Cheema of the Pakistan Muslim League – Quaid (PML-Q), along with his wife, also received the COVID-19 jab from the missing doses.

On the other hand, the principal of the Services Hospital says that the vaccines haven’t disappeared but there has been an issue with the compilation of records.

Provincial Health Minister Dr Yasmin Rashid maintains that the government is carrying out an audit of the vaccine doses and a report related to that will be submitted soon.

Meanwhile, the medical superintendent of Mozang Teaching Hospital has been suspended after 350 coronavirus vaccine doses stored there were spoiled.

According to a notification of the Punjab Specialised Healthcare and Medical Education Department dated March 29, the MS, Dr Munir Ahmad Ghouri, was “placed under suspension, under Section 6 of PEEDA Act, 2006, on accounts of inefficiency and misconduct, with immediate effect”.

A senior official of the provincial health department said that the medical superintendent was suspended after 350 coronavirus vaccine doses, stored in the refrigerator at his office were spoiled.

“He stored the doses in the refrigerator in his office and then went on leave,” the official added.