Milwaukee Pharmacist Is Arrested After Tampering With Moderna Vaccine Doses
A worrying incident involving the deliberate tampering with of vials of Moderna COVID-19 vaccine doses led to an arrest in the Milwaukee area on Dec. 31. The incident involved a pharmacist working for Advocate Aurora Health, at that health system’s Grafton Hospital, in a suburb of Milwaukee.
As the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel’s Alison Dirr and Rory Linnane reported on Thursday afternoon, “A pharmacist accused of tampering with over 500 doses of COVID-19 vaccine at Aurora Medical Center in Grafton was arrested Thursday. Grafton police said the pharmacist, a Grafton resident, removed 57 vials from a refrigerator and left them out overnight last week. They said the man knew this would render the vaccines "useless" and make people who received them believe they were vaccinated when they were not. Each vial contained about 10 doses of vaccine. Aurora discarded more than 500 doses and Thursday said it has determined 57 people were given less-effective or ineffective vaccines.”
Dirr and Linnane reported that “Police recommended felony charges of recklessly endangering safety, adulterating a prescription drug, and criminal damage to property. They estimated the cost of ruined vaccine at $8,000 to $11,000. Police said they are still investigating the man's motive and did not release his name. He is being held at the Ozaukee County Jail. The FBI and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration were also investigating, police said. Jail records show a Steven Brandenburg, 46, was booked Thursday on similar preliminary charges — criminal damage to property and second-degree recklessly endangering safety, both felonies.”
And a non-bylined report online by ABC7-Chicago, the Chicago affiliate of ABC News, stated, of the pharmacist, that “His motive remains unclear. Police said that detectives believe he knew the spoiled doses would be useless and people who received them would mistakenly think they'd been vaccinated when they hadn't. Advocate Aurora Health Care Chief Medical Group Officer Jeff Bahr told reporters during a teleconference Thursday afternoon that the pharmacist deliberately removed 57 vials that held hundreds of doses of the Moderna vaccine from refrigeration at a Grafton medical center overnight on Dec. 24 into Dec. 25, returned them, then left them out again on the night of Dec. 25 into Saturday. The vials contained enough doses to inoculate 570 people,” ABC-7 Chicago.
The report further noted that “A pharmacy technician discovered the vials outside the refrigerator on Saturday morning. Bahr said the pharmacist initially said that he had removed the vaccine to access other items in the refrigerator and had inadvertently failed to replace it. The Moderna vaccine is still viable for 12 hours outside refrigeration, so workers used the vaccine to inoculate 57 people before discarding the rest. Police said the discarded doses were worth between $8,000 and $11,000. Bahr said health system officials grew more suspicious of the pharmacist as they reviewed the incident. After multiple interviews the pharmacist acknowledged Wednesday that he removed the vaccine deliberately and left it out overnight Dec. 24 into Dec. 25, returned it to the refrigerator at some point and then removed it again overnight Dec. 25 to Dec. 26. Bahr said that means that the doses people received Saturday are all but useless. Moderna has told Aurora that there's no safety concerns but the system is monitoring them closely, he said. Bahr declined to comment on the pharmacist's motive.”
The link to a video statement by Dr. Jeff Bahr was included in the non-bylined report online by WISN-12 ABC, the Milwaukee affiliate of ABC News. Barr told the press that over time and with subsequent interviews of the pharmacist, organizational leaders realized that he had acted intentionally. "Over the subsequent days, as we continued our internal review, we became increasingly suspicious of the behavior of the individual in question," Bahr said. "The individual was suspended and after multiple interviews over the course of the week, admitted yesterday to intentionally removing the vaccine from refrigeration."
