Another top Romanian official targeted by COVID vaccine procurement investigations

The president of the National Health Insurance House (CNAS) in Romania, Andrei Baciu, announced his resignation on December 11 as he was placed under criminal investigations by the anticorruption prosecutors (DNA) in the case of the allegedly illegal public procurement of COVID-19 vaccines.

Previously, DNA started criminal investigations against former prime minister Florin Citu and health ministers Vlad Voiculescu and Ioana Mihaila.

In brief, all of them are suspected to have contributed to the procurement of an unreasonably high number of COVID-19 vaccine doses without proper assessments (i.e. feasibility studies) in 2021. Baciu served as state secretary in the Ministry of Health at the time of the deeds and allegedly endorsed a memorandum for the procurement of 4 million doses.

The DNA prosecutors insist on the fact that although the European Commission is the owner of the contract with the vaccine producers, the Member States were earmarked an indicative number of doses and were given an opt-out clause valid for five days. In turn, those suspected by DNA argue that the opt-out clause was too risky at that time, given the unpredictable development of the crisis. They also say Romania ordered fewer doses per capita than the EU average.

Furthermore, Social Democrat minister of health Alexandru Rafila said that Romania paid for only 35 million doses – compared to 85 million doses ordered and included by the prosecutors in calculating the damages, Digi24 reported. Romania, along with other countries, notified the European Commission in a letter that it has enough vaccines in stock and is giving up the surplus of 45 million doses, he explained.

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(Photo source: Inquam Photos / Octav Ganea)