South Korea: Mayor apologises for falling prey to vaccine scam

As the world struggles to procure coronavirus vaccine, a South Korean mayor made a public announcement that Pfizer will be sending 30 million doses within three weeks.

However, his announcement fell short as he soon realised he was being scammed and had to issue a public apology.

Kwon Young-jin, who is critical of the government’s vaccine distribution, took some time to realise that Pfizer does not distribute vaccines through third parties.

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"It was my mistake that this case regarded as one of the simple cases of a failed vaccine import has escalated into a fake vaccine fraud case," the Mayor said. "The image of Daegu was tarnished due to my careless words. I also caused deep wounds and disappointment to the citizens suffering from COVID-19."

Kwon had informed the national media that his team has held negotiations with a foreign trading company in Daegu who have assured supply of 30 million doses of the Pfizer vaccine.

The Medi-City Daegu Council and the trading company had exchanged several documents, but it was the Ministry of Health and Welfare who spotted the leak in the deal after they claimed it had "reliability issues".