Interim Peruvian President Francisco Sagasti revealed that his administration has delivered to prosecutors the names of 487 government officials, including former president Martín Vizcarra, who abused their positions of power to secure doses of the Chinese-made Sinopharm COVID-19 vaccine well before it was made available to the public. The scandal has already seen the resignation of Health Minister Pilar Mazzetti, Deputy Health Minister Luis Suárez Ognio, and Foreign Minister Elizabeth Astete. It has also severely diminished the popularity and legacy of former leader Vizcarra, whose unceremonious impeachment in November drew widespread protests.
In a televised address, Sagasti said, “These people who were part of our government failed to do their duty as public servants,” and unleashed at the “many public officials who took advantage of their position”. He declared, “Those who took part in these inappropriate acts will not have a place in my administration.”
Vizcarra was inoculated alongside his wife and brother in October. Likewise, Foreign Minister Astete and Health Minister Mazzetti admitted that they had received their shots in January. Astete regrated her “serious mistake” and said she would now back out of receiving a second dose. On the other hand, Vizcarra’s wife, Maribel Díaz, who is now running for a seat in Congress, defended their actions, saying they were part of a vaccine trial and were forced to “maintain confidentiality”. However, Cayetano Heredia University, which runs the trials, rejected these claims, saying that neither Vizcarra nor his wife were on the list of volunteer participants.
The opposition-led Congress will meet today to discuss whether or not to launch an official investigation into the matter. President Sagasti has already tasked the new health minister, Oscar Ugarte, with finding out which other officials were vaccinated. Simultaneously, authorities are working to submit the names all those implicated in the scandal to the Comptroller General’s Office, the Public Prosecutor’s Office, the Attorney General’s Office, and the Health Minister’s Investigation Commission before launching formal proceedings. National Prosecutor Zoraida Avalos revealed, however, the legal action has already been initiated against former President Vizcarra for abusing his position.
The Cayetano Heredia University had been conducting a trial of the vaccine since September. There were 3,200 surplus doses in these trials, and these were reserved for researchers. However, roughly 600 doses were secretly administered to government officials. Against this backdrop, the blame as fallen on the director of the clinical trial, German Malaga, who allegedly covertly offered to vaccinate government officials. These claims have been roughly corroborated by President Sagasti, who said that “senior public officials were vaccinated” using the surplus of roughly 2,000 vaccine doses.
China’s embassy in Peru, meanwhile, has sought to distance itself from the scandal, saying that no “courtesy vaccines” were provided.
Health Minister Mazzetti secured 1 million doses of the Sinopharm vaccine on January 7, and Peru received its first batch of 300,000 doses on February 7. This controversy, therefore, has generated popular discontent, particularly among health care professionals and workers, given that 306 doctors and 125 nurses have died from the virus that has infected over 20,000 health workers.
This incident has also drawn attention to the instability within the nation’s health ministry, given that Ugarte is Peru’s fifth health minister since the pandemic began last year. It is not clear what role this has had on the government’s efforts to contain the virus, but Peru has recorded over 1.2 million cases of COVID-19 and more than 43,000 deaths, and continues to register around 6,000 cases per day.
The country’s foreign ministry has seen similar instability, with Allan Wagner becoming the sixth foreign minister in less than a year.
All of this chaos comes at a time when Peru is gearing up for its general elections on April 11, and reflects poorly on a government that has been rocked by scandal after scandal over the past year.
Peruvian President Sagasti Reveals 500 Gov’t Officials Secretly Received COVID-19 Vaccines
A scandal involving close to 500 government officials in Peru has led to the resignation of the country’s health and foreign minister and implicated former President Martín Vizcarra.
February 17, 2021
IMAGE SOURCE: PERUVIAN PRESIDENCYPeruvian President Francisco Sagasti