A congressional report published Tuesday shows that a biotech company hid the real number of COVID-19 vaccine doses that were contaminated.
Emergent BioSolutions was hired to produce hundreds of millions of vaccine doses.
The new report gathered by the House Committee on Oversight and Reform shows that, between March 2020 and February 2022, the company discarded up to 400 million vaccine doses due to ingredients becoming contaminated.
Previous estimates of discarded doses were lower.
According to the report, executives at the company had privately raised concerns about quality control before ingredients were contaminated.
The report goes on to show that lab workers misled government inspectors about issues at the plant in Bayview, Maryland.
They reportedly told the FDA that they were making improvements at the plant to be in full compliance. The agency noted deficiencies at the plant and when it returned months later, employees reportedly tried to hide potential problems.
It wasn’t until March of 2021 that Emergent notified the Department of Health and Human Services about the contaminated doses.
The government then terminated its vaccine production contract with Emergent in November of 2021.
None of the compromised ingredients made it into released vaccine doses.
A spokesperson for Emergent told ABC News, "Emergent has been open and forthcoming with the FDA, Congress and our partners about the work at our Bayview site and the challenges that were encountered, including providing thousands of documents, willingly participating in a congressional hearing and inviting them to visit our facilities."
Separately, the company told New York Times that it had not yet seen the government report.
