1,710 doses of Covid vaccine stolen, returned with apology

DOSES LEFT OUTSIDE POLICE STATION WITH A NOTE SAYING THE THIEF DID NOT KNOW IT WAS COVID VACCINE

ROHTAK: Hours after a thief stole 1,710 doses of Covid-19 vaccine, comprising 440 doses of Covaxin and 1,270 doses of Covishield, from the PPE centre of civil hospital in Jind at 12.44am on Thursday, he left the doses at a tea stall outside Jind Civil Lines police station.

Jind deputy superintendent of police (DSP) Jitender Katkar said that the thief had handed over a sealed packet to an old man who was sitting at the tea stall outside the police station.

“The thief told the old man to hand over the packet to a police personnel and said that there is food inside the packet. When the man brought the packet to the cops, they found vaccine doses inside it,” the DSP said.

“We called the doctors and they checked the vials. No vaccine was found missing. The thief had also written a note saying ‘Sorry, I did not know it was corona vaccine’. We are checking the CCTV footage near the tea stall to identify the thief,” the DSP added.

Police have registered a case under Sections 380 and 457 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) against the unknown person.

Earlier in the day, Police said two men were caught on CCTV, breaking into the hospital’s store past midnight. “We have studied the footage in which the two men are seeing breaking into three locks to reach the vaccine stock,” the spokesman said.

‘Thief may have wanted to steal remdesivir’

Civil surgeon Dr Manjeet Singh said, “It seems the thief came to steal remdesivir, the medicine to treat Covid-19, but took away Covaxin and Covishield.” The civil surgeon said that despite the theft, there is no shortage of vaccine.

“We have over 6,000 doses of vaccine and there is no shortage,” he added.

Sheela Devi, store in-charge, said that a sanitation worker called her up on Thursday morning to report that the lock of the store was broken.