As stupid as this sounds, this is extremely standard policy in many, many jobs. Just because something is expiring doesn't mean you can use it against the standing rules and procedures.
And seriously on the other hand, most jobs are not potentially life and death situations. There are few, if any parallel situations to this. Maybe it would be akin to parking a company vehicle incorrectly so you could stop and help an injured person.
A lot of this "it was policy" argument fails when Harris County failed to produce evidence of said policy and its instruction.
The manager's pet getting first pick of the dumpster at a small machine shop is very different than the same thing at a ship yard.
> After that, he said, the message was: “Just put it in people’s arms. We don’t want any doses to go to waste. Period.”
It sounds like not wasting the limited vaccine was actual policy (possibly unofficial policy, but the message he was receiving).
And this would be the right policy. It's absolutely correct to get vaccines into people before the expire, so long as you hav correctly exhausted all means available to you of finding the right people.
The issue is that the states haven't made it easy for providers to find the right people when you have six hours remaining to use a vaccine.
> Dr. Gokal said he called a Harris County public health official in charge of operations to report his plans to find 10 people to receive the remaining doses. He said he was told, simply: OK.
This lines up with what I know from family members doing vaccinations in other areas.
> a prosecutor told him by email that there were no written protocols from late December; nor had a written wait list yet been found.
And giving short life vaccines to people with co-morbidities during a pandemic is a world of difference than grocery store food. I'm not sure why we're even comparing the two.
Not saying it's good - but there are reasons these policies are in place.
It can also result in the situations we see here which sounds like this doctor had the best of intentions and is being punished for it.
If they act unethically, there is a built in method to address this through the licensing boards that regulate them.
Criminal behavior is different, but the Judge that heard the case completely rejected the argument that the behavior was criminal.
>On Dec. 22, Dr. Gokal joined a conference call in which state health officials explained the protocols for administering the recently approved Moderna vaccine. The 10 or 11 doses in a vial are viable for six hours after the seal is punctured.
>Dr. Gokal said the advice was to vaccinate people eligible under the 1(a) category (health care workers and residents in long-term-care facilities), then those under the 1(b) category (people over 65 or with a health condition that increases risk of severe Covid-related illness).
>After that, he said, the message was: “Just put it in people’s arms. We don’t want any doses to go to waste. Period.”
What he did was explicitly ordered by the government. It is what the health department told everybody to do, in no uncertain terms.
and... vaccines for deadly stuff that people NEED/MUST receive LOL