Pfizer Vaccines Purchased from Romania Transferred to Private Boxes Instead of Official Packaging [2021 National Audit]

Among the 1,503,000 doses of Pfizer vaccines purchased from Romania last month on the 2nd, a cargo plane carrying the first batch of 526,500 Pfizer vaccine doses arrived at the cargo terminal of Incheon International Airport on the afternoon of the 2nd.
mon@yna.co.kr [Image source=Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Reporter Lee Chun-hee] It has been confirmed that the 1,053,000 doses of Pfizer vaccines purchased by our government through vaccine cooperation with Romania were delivered in separate boxes rather than Pfizer's official certified packaging boxes.

According to data submitted by the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) to Baek Jong-heon, a member of the National Assembly's Health and Welfare Committee from the People Power Party, on the 7th, the vaccines introduced from Romania last month were found to have been transported using vaccine packaging boxes provided by a private transportation company, not Pfizer's official certified packaging boxes.

This is because the Romanian government returned the packaging boxes directly to the manufacturer after purchasing the Pfizer vaccines. Pfizer vaccines were developed to be distributed at ultra-low temperatures between minus 90 and 60 degrees Celsius. This was why the initial ultra-low temperature distribution 'cold chain' was essential. However, it has recently been understood that storage and delivery are possible for two weeks even at normal freezer temperatures between minus 25 and 15 degrees Celsius.

Therefore, during distribution, Pfizer vaccines are delivered in specially made ultra-low temperature containers. At first glance, they look like ordinary boxes, but they are made of special materials that are highly moisture-resistant and have excellent insulation performance by coating corrugated cardboard with polymer compounds or using new plastic materials. These boxes are double-packaged, and refrigerants are placed between them to maintain ultra-low temperatures. When Pfizer vaccines are supplied within Europe, Pfizer packages and transports them in these containers directly from the factory.

Typically, for vaccines supplied by Pfizer to Korea, the vaccines are taken out from the shipment delivered by Korea Pfizer, and the empty packaging boxes are sent back to Belgium for recycling. Pfizer even refers to these boxes as 'pizza boxes' as a code for security reasons.

A cargo plane carrying the first batch of Pfizer vaccines, totaling 526,500 doses out of 1,503,000 doses of Pfizer vaccines purchased from Romania on the 2nd of last month, arrived at the cargo terminal of Incheon International Airport on the afternoon of the 2nd.
[Image source=Yonhap News]

However, in the case of vaccines purchased from Romania this time, they were packed in packaging boxes and dry boxes provided by company W, selected by the KDCA. At the time of the transportation contract, the KDCA evaluated W's boxes as "not officially certified by Pfizer but actually used for transporting Pfizer vaccines."

Initially, the KDCA considered contracting with another company besides the selected transportation company. However, that company responded, "There is no way to separately procure and provide (special packaging containers for Pfizer)," and "Regarding packaging containers, it is believed that the Romanian government should request Pfizer for procurement of packaging containers." Accordingly, the KDCA excluded that company from the contract due to the difficulty in providing packaging boxes and selected company W as the transportation company.

Regarding this, Assemblyman Baek said, "There are criticisms that special packaging boxes certified by Pfizer should have been provided and then transported to maintain vaccine quality and manufacturer A/S guarantees." According to Assemblyman Baek, as of the 5th, six lot numbers provided by Romania have been administered a total of 1,072,181 doses. Among these, there were 4,031 reports of adverse reactions, with an adverse reaction reporting rate of 0.38%. This is slightly higher than the overall adverse reaction reporting rate of 0.37% for Pfizer vaccines announced by the KDCA as of midnight on the 6th.

The health authorities stated that issues related to vaccine quality A/S are confidential contractual matters with the manufacturer and cannot be disclosed, and Korea Pfizer also said it could not disclose whether guarantees apply.

Baek Jong-heon, Member of the People Power Party (Photo by Baek Jong-heon)

Assemblyman Baek Jong-heon said, "A special report and cause analysis should be conducted to determine whether there were any problems with the initial cold chain in the causality investigation of the Romanian Pfizer vaccines," and added, "It should be transparently clarified whether manufacturer A/S is definitely guaranteed for the Romanian vaccine quality issues."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.