Three Taipei City Government health officials have been transferred over a scandal involving clinics administering COVID-19 vaccines to people not eligible to receive them, the city government confirmed on Saturday.
Yu Tsan-hua (余燦華), head of the Taipei Department of Health’s Disease Control Division, was reassigned to head the Zhongzheng District (中正) Health Center while the city’s Clean Governance Committee reviews administrative errors allegedly made by him and two other department officials, the department said.
Zhongzheng District Health Center head Zhang Hui-mei (張惠美) has taken Yu’s position, the department said, adding that she has experience working in the Disease Control Division.
The three officials have been under review since June 19, when an initial internal affairs investigation determined that they had potentially played a role in the distribution of vaccines in ways that contravened government protocols.
This was after Department of Health Commissioner Huang Shier-chieg (黃世傑) offered to resign on June 10, when it was revealed that several clinics in the city’s COVID-19 vaccination program had vaccinated people not on the central government’s list of priority groups.
One of the clinics, the Good Liver Clinic, vaccinated staff and volunteers at its two offices, even though they did not meet the criteria of being medical workers eligible for vaccination early last month. The clinics have been fined up to NT$2 million (US$71,454) per location and removed from the vaccination program.
Huang’s resignation was not accepted and he has been placed on leave while the investigation is under way, Taipei Deputy Mayor Tsai Ping-kun (蔡炳坤) said.
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