In an inexplicable decision, Department of Health officials presented the anticovid vaccines in boxes of drugs that arrived two weeks earlier. Bukele came out to say that boxes of other vaccines had been recycled, which was described as a mistake by representatives of the medical union.
The Salvadoran government has deployed a large number of soldiers, medical personnel, helicopters, boats, trucks with signs announcing the content to be transferred, cameramen, drones, photographers and journalists to inform the Salvadoran population of the arrival of 20 thousand doses of the drug. vaccine. against COVID-19, on Feb. 17, as a result of a purchase by Bukele’s administration of the Serum Institute of India, according to the announcement from the government apparatus.
Although neither President Bukele nor the Minister of Health Francisco Alabí has detailed the cost of purchasing Covishield vaccines, which is endorsed by the English laboratory AstraZeneca, they emphasized that they are not the product of a donation from the Indian government these 20 thousand doses were the first to enter the country.
SEE: Doctors think it “ridiculous” that government recycles boxes of measles vaccines to carry doses of COVID-19
The target group of primary health workers to be vaccinated is 50,000, so the number of vaccinations does not cover the total population. Nor has the government said whether the amount received on Wednesday should be divided by 10,000 for the first dose and the same amount for the second.
The government’s social networks are filled with images of health workers receiving first doses in different parts of the country over the next few hours.
Detail of the box of vaccines against COVID-19 delivered in Santa Rosa de Lima. / Photo EDH courtesy
The beginning of the questions
But on Thursday, early in the morning, another version of the advent of immunizations emerged. A photo uploaded by the Government Communications Secretariat on Twitter showed the labels or vignettes on one of the boxes in which the COVID-19 vaccines were shipped. By reading and following the information on the labels, it was possible to know that this box entered El Salvador on February 3.
Therefore, the question arose: If the label on the box that the Covishield vaccine is shipped to indicates that it entered the country on February 3, why does the government announce its arrival until February 17?
The journalist Cecibel Romero, who works with Salud con Lupa, has determined that one of the boxes delivered Wednesday evening at a health post in Santa Rosa de Lima, La Unión, contained two vignettes.
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In addition to that of Santa Rosa de Lima, other photos shown by the same government in its communication device on social networks made it clear that both vignettes (called green and white), with the same information about flights and origin, were present in other boxes shipped with vaccines for COVID-19 in other locations, such as Zacatecoluca, San Vicente, Hospital Rosales and San Miguel.
The first is a green vignette, indicating that this box was part of 98 in a shipment that departed from Mumbai (India) on January 31 via the Air France plane and then passed through Charles de Gaulles airport in France on February 1. according to the freight registration site afklcargo.com arriving in Miami the same day, which reports official information on international flights.
The other clue is in the white vignette, number 406-0229 9253, as shown in the image taken in Santa Rosa de Lima, of a shipment from the UPS company, which was shipped from Miami to El Salvador arrived. : 17 in the morning. For example, it is registered in the digital system of the said shipping company.
According to airline tracking, vaccines arrived in El Salvador on Feb. 3
The Air France report indicates that the shipment involved vaccines and specialty drugs, which consisted of 98 pieces, equivalent to 2,467 kilos in weight. UPS also indicates that there were 98 boxes.
El Diario de Hoy crossed this information with other boxes of Covishield vaccines distributed by India in other countries, where each box contains 1200 vials. 10 doses of vaccines can be obtained from each vial. Therefore, 1,176,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccine would have entered that shipment.
The statement of the government
The official information is that all 20,000 doses received on February 17 came from a flight from Mumbai, India, from the Spanish company Iberia.
The journalistic finding provoked a series of negative comments against the government’s work in social networks, which in turn prompted a quick response from President Nayib Bukele, where he claimed the Indian Embassy, Iberia, AstraZeneca and PAHO airline support him. version, that the 20 thousand doses published on February 17 were the first and only to enter the country.
Bukele confirmed that a batch of vaccines came in on Feb. 3, but they were not for COVID-19. However, the government has recycled the boxes of these vaccines.
Later, Thursday at 11:28 a.m., President Bukele posted a tweet, confirming that there were vaccines entering the country on Feb. 3, but arguing that they were not vaccines against COVID-19, but vaccines against mumps and measles. . and rubella.
He explained that the Serum Institute of India is a regular supplier to the Salvadoran government, and that “the boxes are recycled and used to protect smaller boxes,” which explained why one of these boxes was occupied to COVID, according to the president. mobilize vaccines. 19.
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In the photo released by the Santa Rosa de Lima press office, the box has a sticker stating that the vaccines must be stored at a temperature between +2 and +8 degrees Celsius, a temperature required for the AstraZeneca for COVID-19 although it is also a standard temperature that applies to other types of medications.
At around 12:30 PM, the office of the Pan American Health Organization in El Salvador (PAHO) released a statement on its website about the photo “of a thermal box of vaccines that arrived in the country last year. Feb. 3”.
PAHO detailed that “the image with a thermal box circulating on social networks corresponds to 100,000 doses of the Measles, Rubella and Mumps (MMR) vaccine from the country’s mainstream vaccine program manufactured by the Serum Institute of India,” that on February 3 this year and was acquired through the PAHO / WHO Revolving Fund, ”reported PAHO.
In addition, the organization pointed out that a thermal box works for transferring vaccines from one place to another and ensures proper temperature conditions.
However, it did not state in its statement whether it approves or certifies the recycling of the same boxes for the carriage of other vaccines, as the government said happened in this case.