Thousands receive fake flu shots?

The Houston Chronicle has the best coverage of this story and it is a (free) subscription-only site. It's worth reading if you're interested in medical fraud cases with all sorts of twists and turns - wilder than anything I could have made up. I'm prejudiced, but I believe that this case points out just one reason why you need to see your family doctor for medical care.

And, perhaps this is why there's a push to increase the Federal government involvement in producing flu vaccines? Could we be facing a national defense issue?

Monday - Suspect thought flu vaccine was genuine
Tuesday - Bail denied
And, just to keep you interested here's a similar case from 2003, in Washington State.

Brief report from no-registration Akron, Ohio Beacon Journal here.


Summary of the news reports on the recent case: A man with passports from both Israel and Jordan who originally claimed to be a plastic surgeon from Israel and who has some undetermined connection with a home-health agency is charged with arranging a complicated scam to defraud Exxon-Mobile in Houston and, possibly, Medicare and nursing home patients by administering flu shots that he bought last month from two men he only knows as "Larry" and "Robert."

A woman who has a relative who knows someone at Exxon-Mobile and who works for a local family doctor worked out the deal with the health fair. The doctor says he never knew about the contract and has fired the woman.

A man who works for the suspect who allegedly drew up the shots into syringes told someone that he had pricked his own finger several times in the process, so the needles may not have been sterile.

And he promises not to leave the country if released on bail.