Government spent £239m on vaccines for swine flu

It has been revealed that the Government spent £239m stocking up on swine flu vaccines.

The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) ordered the Department of Health to release the data after it failed to comply with a freedom of information (FOI) request.

The Government has always cited commercial confidentiality as a reason for not disclosing the information, but the ICO ruled it was in the public interest.

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Yesterday the department confirmed it had spent £239m on the jab up to the end of vaccine deliveries in April 2010.

The money was paid to GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) for its Pandemrix vaccine, and Baxter for Celvapan.

Some 90 million doses were ordered by the UK government, with most of the vaccine supplied by GSK.

In April 2010, the Government announced it had struck a deal with GSK to cancel part of its massive order for the vaccine, saving the UK approximately one-third of the original value of the orders with GSK.