PHOTOGRAPHY: Milwaukee pharmacist who ‘deliberately spoiled 57 vials of the Modern vaccine

The police arrested a Wisconsin pharmacist accused of deliberately damaging 57 vials of the Modern COVID-19 vaccine, taking them out of a refrigerator and leaving them out overnight, before 57 people received the ‘ineffective’ dose.

Grafton Police said the former employee of Advocate Aurora Health Hospital in Grafton was arrested on Thursday afternoon on charges of recklessly jeopardizing security, tampering with a prescription drug and criminal property damage.

The male health professional was not officially identified. A list of prisoners at Ozaukee County Jail shows that Steven Bandenburg, 46, was charged on Thursday on the same charges.

Brandenburg is also listed as a licensed pharmacist in Wisconsin.

Police began investigating the incident at the hospital on Wednesday, but have not yet identified the reason. The value of spoiled vaccines is estimated at about $ 8,000 to $ 11,000.

The suspect’s arrest takes place on the same day that Wisconsin health officials revealed that 57 people received the ineffective dose of the vaccine after it was “deliberately” spoiled.

Dr. Jeff Bahr, president of Aurora Health Care Medical Group in Wisconsin, said on Thursday that the culprit not only took the bottles out of the refrigerator overnight on Friday, as initially thought, but also did so Thursday, night – returning them to the refrigerator the next morning before anyone notices.

The chain approached the suspect when a pharmaceutical technician discovered the bottles in the refrigerator on Saturday morning.

Since hospital staff were unaware that they too had been left out the night before, some of the doses were considered to be good and were given to 57 people before the rest were discarded.

Aurora Medical Center Grafton is now working with Moderna to determine how affected individuals can now be safely vaccinated.

The medical center originally thought the doses “were inadvertently removed from a pharmacy refrigerator overnight”, but on Wednesday said the culprit acted “intentionally” and fired him, while the Grafton Police and the FBI launched an investigation .

Bahr gave a press conference via Zoom on Thursday, where he revealed that the culprit was a hospital pharmacist and gave more details about the saga.

He said a pharmacy technician first discovered 57 vials of Moderna vaccine were left outside the refrigerator in which they were stored early Saturday morning.

The technician returned the bottles to the refrigerator and reported the incident to his superiors.

Bahr said the pharmacist in charge claimed at first that they simply made an ‘inadvertent mistake’ by leaving them out of the refrigerator when they were accessing other items in the same unit.

The vaccine can be kept out of the refrigerator for up to 12 hours before it becomes ineffective.

Based on the belief that the removal was accidental and that the vials had been out of the refrigerator less than that time, the hospital’s clinical leaders ‘determined that vaccines could still be administered’ that morning.

A total of 57 people received their first dose of the Moderna vaccine on the morning of December 26 at the Aurora Medical Center Grafton.

The rest of the vials were then discarded after ‘becoming ineffective’.

But after an internal review, the hospital staff became “increasingly suspicious” of the pharmacist’s behavior over the next few days, according to Bahr.

He was suspended before finally admitting ‘after several interviews’ that he ‘intentionally removed’ the jars from the refrigerator.

The pharmacist also admitted that he removed the bottles from the refrigerator and left them out overnight on Thursday, but returned them to the refrigerator on Friday morning before anyone saw them.

That means the bottles were really ineffective or ineffective, said Bahr.

Bahr insisted that there is “no evidence” that the ineffective doses may have harmed the individuals given them and the hospital is working with Moderna to formulate a plan for how the affected people can safely receive an effective dose.

“The 57 were notified,” said Bahr.

‘There is no evidence that vaccines have caused any harm to them other than being potentially less effective or ineffective.

“Moderna has assured us that there are no safety concerns about administering a vaccine that has been out of the fridge for a long time. We will partner with them and the FDA to discover a strategy on the future vaccination of the 57 affected individuals. ‘

The head of the hospital also said he was confident that no bottle other than 57 was damaged because the hospital did not receive a dose before the day in question.

There is also “no evidence” that he tampered with the vaccine in any other way, except by removing it from the refrigerator, Bahr said, while trying to reassure people that it was the work of a “bad actor, not a lawsuit.” bad’.

Police and federal authorities launched an investigation on Wednesday after the Wisconsin health care system said the official admitted to deliberately spoiling 500 doses of the coronavirus vaccine.

Aurora Medical Center reported for the first time that the doses were spoiled on Saturday, saying they were accidentally left uncooled overnight by an Aurora Medical Center employee in Grafton.

The health care system said Wednesday that doses of the vaccine were deliberately spoiled.

In a note on Wednesday, Aurora said the official involved “acknowledged that he intentionally removed the vaccine from refrigeration”.

Aurora said she fired the employee and referred the case to the authorities.

“We continue to believe that vaccination is our way out of the pandemic. We are more than disappointed that this individual’s actions will result in more than 500 people being delayed in receiving the vaccine, ‘the statement said.

Police and federal authorities launched an investigation on Wednesday.

The number of COVID-19 cases in Wisconsin continued to rise after falling in early December.

The state Department of Health Services reported 3,810 new confirmed cases on Thursday, marking the third consecutive day of increase in daily infections.

The state has seen 481,102 cases.

COVID-19 was a factor in another 41 deaths, bringing the total number of deaths in the state to 4,859. The survival rate remained unchanged at 99 percent.