Three health workers have been detained over the vaccine
accident which killed one child and sickened 120 others in Sixian
County in east China's Anhui
Province.
The three people are Zhou Shimin, director of Dazhuang Township
Hospital, Hou Huafeng, head of Dazhuang Town Health Care and
Epidemic Prevention Station, and Zhou Shikai, a health worker who
purchased the involved hepatitis A vaccines.
Without official permission, the town epidemic prevention
station organized village doctors to vaccinate about 2,500 students
in 19 schools in 17 villages on June 16 and 17, according to local
police.
Several students reported dizziness, breath difficulties and
limb numbness on the morning of June 17.
Local hospitals had received 121 sickened students by Friday,
including a six-year-old pupil who died on Thursday.
The town epidemic prevention station purchased 1,000 hepatitis A
vaccines from county epidemic prevention center and 3,000 others
from a private medicine provider Zhang Peng, who has disappeared
after the accident.
Local police are still hunting for Zhang, and tracing down
sources of the vaccines.
The rest vaccines have been sealed, and the samples were sent to
state institution for test.?
(Xinhua News Agency June 26, 2005)