Brazil investigates Health Ministry deal to buy Covaxin vaccine

Brazil’s federal prosecutor’s office is investigating possible irregularities in a Health Ministry contract to purchase 20 million doses of the Covaxin vaccine manufactured by Indian laboratory Bharat Biotech.

The agreement signed in February commits the ministry to pay $320 million - at a cost of $15 per vaccine dose - to Precisa Medicamentos, the representative of Bharat Biotech in Brazil, according to a document sent to The Associated Press by the prosecutor general’s press office.

The price per dose, which was higher than for other COVID-19 vaccines, drew prosecutors’ attention, as did the fact that ministry officials apparently ignored a history of alleged irregularities by Precisa associates in previous contracts with the federal government.

Precisa said in a statement the vaccine price agreed to with Brazil’s Health Ministry was the same as the price negotiated with 13 other countries and that the deal “followed all formal paths and was carried out transparently.”

Federal prosecutor Luciana Loureiro Oliveira said in a document signed on June 16 that three years ago Precisa associates, through another company, entered a contract with the Health Ministry for the sale of medicines that were never delivered.

Oliveira wrote that the ministry signed a purchase contract for the Bharat Biotech vaccine even though it had not been approved by Brazil’s health agency, Anvisa, and that other already-approved vaccines were on the market at lower prices.

“The history of irregularities involving Precisa partners and the high price paid for the contracted doses require a thorough investigation in both civil and criminal matters,” Oliveira wrote.

Francisco Maximiano, a Precisa shareholder, was to appear Tuesday before a Senate commission investigating federal government omissions in the handling of the pandemic, but presented a petition to postpone his testimony saying he was in quarantine after arriving from India, according to a statement from his lawyers.

Anvisa approved the import of the Covaxin vaccine with restrictions on June 4, allowing the entry of only 4 million doses. In March, the agency had rejected a request to import the vaccine, citing concerns over a lack of documentation and information on its safety.