Pak wastes $3.7 million worth of donated vaccines
March 03, 2015 01:37
Vaccines worth $3.7 million provided by UNICEF to protect Pakistani children from different diseases were wasted due to official negligence to store them properly, a senior minister said today.
Minister of state for National Health Services Saira Afzal Tarar said that some official have been suspended and a probe has been launched to find if more people were involved.
The wasted medicines were combination of different vaccines and were used to immunize children against tetanus, diphtheria, whooping cough, hepatitis B, meningitis and pneumonia.
According to the standard procedure these vaccines must be kept at cold places like refrigerators but no precaution were taken by the officials responsible for maintaining the temperature, Tarar said.
However, an official of Health Ministry said that the frequent power outage was the main cause of the loss as top bosses failed to address the problem despite complaints by lower staff.
The wasted vaccines were donated by UNICEF and included about 1.3 million doses.
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