TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) – Chinese police have arrested more than 80 suspected members of a criminal group that was making and selling fake COVID-19 vaccines, including to other countries.
Police in Beijing and Jiangsu and Shandong provinces dispersed the group led by a suspected surname Kong who was producing fake vaccines, which consisted of a simple saline solution, the official Xinhua news agency reported.
The vaccines were sold in China and other countries, although it was unclear which ones. The group has been active since last September, according to state media.
“China has already reported the situation to the countries in question,” said Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin at a daily press conference on Tuesday.
“The Chinese government places a high value on vaccine safety and will continue to strive to rigorously process any counterfeits, fake sales and illegal businesses and other related actions involving vaccines,” said Wang. “At the same time, China will strengthen our law enforcement cooperation with the relevant countries, to seriously prevent the spread of this type of illegal and criminal action.” He offered no further details.
China has a long history of vaccine scandals resulting from manufacturing problems and also from commercial practices. In 2016, police arrested two people who were responsible for a gang that sold millions of vaccines improperly stored across the country.
In response to recent scandals, China has reformed vaccine safety regulations and increased criminal penalties for those caught forging.
Internally, many Chinese citizens did not trust home vaccines and previous research has shown that confidence in vaccines has declined after scandals like the one in 2016. However, since the pandemic hit, confidence has been high. A total of 74% of respondents to a recent survey published in Chinese business magazine Caixin said they would get a COVID-19 vaccine if it was available.
China has at least seven COVID-19 vaccines in the last phase of clinical trials, and one that has been approved for domestic use, made by state-owned Sinopharm.
Chinese vaccine manufacturers took advantage of the opportunity offered by the pandemic to go global, with Sinopharm and other Chinese companies doing business or donating their vaccines in at least 27 countries around the world.
Internally, China gave more than 24 million doses of its candidate vaccines grown at home, as part of a mass vaccination campaign. So far, it has refrained from giving the vaccine to older people, instead targeting key groups, such as medical workers and workers working in food-related industries, as well as adults between the ages of 18 and 59.
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Associated Press researcher Liu Zheng in Beijing contributed to this report.