The Hindu and Sri Lanka News21 March 2009
A 12-year-old girl student, Peshala Hansini, died and 27 others were admitted to a hospital after being administered a vaccine against Rubella in Sri Lanka's Matara district, prompting President Mahinda Rajapaksa to order a probe.
Health Ministry official, B. Wanninayake, said here that one of the 28 girls, who fell ill and were admitted to a hospital on Thursday after the vaccine reacted, died on Friday morning.
Parliamentary Group Leader Anura Kumara Dissanayake said, "It has become a habit and practice of some health officials to release some stocks of outdated medicines during the last couple of days of any audit year so that they could complete their documents with the targeted figures by clearing the old stocks." The issue of these expired medicines has become a serious threat against the public health.
Medical team ignored dead girl's mother's plea
Peshala Hansini's mother R.V. Kalyani has sent a letter to the medical team that was handling the vaccination program to first find out whether it was advisable to administer the Rubella vaccine on her daughter as she was allergic to certain types of food and is unable to take any food containing cow milk. St. Thomas Girls School Principal R. S. Pathirana confirms that Hansini had handed over her mother's letter to the medical team before she was vaccinated.
Read full article here (The Hindu)
Read full article here (Sri Lanka News)
Meanwhile...
MMR Vaccine Recall Issued by Merck in Canada After 5 Injuries
December 14, 2007
All five cases involved adults with a history of allergy. The adverse events are related to one lot in Alberta and affected young adults; there have been no reported cases affecting babies.
[Only five cases of allergic reaction in Canada and they recalled the vaccine, but 27 injuries and 1 death in Sri Lanka and... nothing.]
The same day the Canadian MMR-II recall was issued, Merck & Co. Inc. recalled about 1.2 million doses of vaccines—11 lots of PedvaxHIB vaccine and two lots of Comvax vaccine—when quality control checks revealed that production equipment might not have been properly sterilized.
[That's 14 hot lots in one day. One lot is approximately 100,000 vaccines, so that's 1,400,000 vaccines. That's a lot of money! Do you think they're going to dump this? That's right, dump it in Third World countries - where children's lives are cheaper.]
See also:
• Merck Gets Warning Letter from FDA over Shoddy Manufacturing Practises
• Jenny Tetlock: Gardasil Vaccine Death #41. Is Your Child Next?
• Vaccine Developer Would Not Vaccinate His Own Child