As suspicions over poor vaccine management by the Moon Jae-in administration, which led nationwide vaccinations during the COVID-19 pandemic, resurface, calls to hold Jung Eun-kyeong, who was head of the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency at the time and is now the Minister of the Ministry of Health and Welfare, accountable are reigniting. Despite the Board of Audit and Inspection's findings and complaints filed by civic groups, police dismissed the cases, fueling the controversy instead.
The Yeongdeungpo Police Station in Seoul said on the 28th that it had dismissed on the 1st of this month a case in which former President Moon Jae-in, Minister Jung Eun-kyeong, and former Health and Welfare Minister Kwon Deok-cheol were accused of abuse of authority, dereliction of duty, and violating the Pharmaceutical Affairs Act, among other charges. Police closed the case without a separate investigation, determining that the charges were not established.
However, the investigation is not completely over. The Gangnam Police Station in Seoul is separately investigating the same issue after receiving a complaint alleging that authorities "pushed ahead with vaccinations while concealing reports of foreign substances in vaccines." On the 2nd of this month, it booked the former president and the minister and questioned the complainant.
The controversy stems from safety issues raised during the vaccination process. Reports of deaths after some vaccinations and adverse reactions fueled distrust, and some civic groups, including the "Coalition of Families of COVID-19 Vaccine Victims," claim the government pushed ahead with vaccinations while downplaying or concealing related information.
The Board of Audit and Inspection also pointed to problems. According to the report "Assessment and analysis of the COVID-19 response" released in February, a total of 1,285 reports of foreign substances in vaccines were received. Of these, cases of rubber stopper fragments from vials accounted for the majority (65%), and 127 reports (9.9%) involved substances of concern such as mold, hair, and silicon dioxide.
The issue lies in the response. Under the current manual, when a foreign substance is found, the disease agency must request a quality review from the drug safety authority, but the Board of Audit and Inspection said the disease agency did not notify the authority and only informed the manufacturer, then accepted the manufacturer's own findings without separate verification. It also confirmed that between 2021 and 2023, 2,703 people received vaccines past their expiration dates.
The disease agency immediately pushed back. It said all vaccine lots reported to contain foreign substances were fully quarantined and not actually administered, and no quality issues were found among 14.2 million doses from the same lot numbers.
Political sparring is also intensifying. Representative Kim Mi-ae of the People Power Party, the opposition secretary on the National Assembly Health and Welfare Committee, said, "The ruling party must agree to a parliamentary investigation to uncover the full truth, punish those responsible, and craft measures to prevent a recurrence."
The problem is that the controversy could affect current quarantine policies. With new variants emerging and a possible summer resurgence raised, vaccinations are again being recommended, but concerns are growing that already low vaccination rates could be compounded by distrust in the management system.
Amid the controversy over poor vaccine management, Minister Jung's policy burdens are mounting. Multiple complex tasks are piling up at once, from expanding medical personnel and overhauling essential care to addressing supply chain issues.
The government recently finalized an increase in enrollment for 32 medical schools outside Seoul and announced a plan to select all additional students as regional physicians. It must simultaneously address the structural challenge of filling gaps in essential regional care.
As staffing shortages worsen in medically underserved areas that have long relied on public health doctors, calls are growing for more fundamental measures. The current "emergency support project for health care in underserved areas" is being criticized as a stopgap.
At a full meeting of the National Assembly's welfare committee on the 2nd for the first supplementary budget bill for 2026, Representative Seo Young-seok of the Democratic Party of Korea said, "The current situation of public health doctors is effectively a disaster," adding, "Short-term measures are necessary, but in the long term, fundamental steps are needed so public health doctors can perform their roles in a substantive way."
The Ministry of Health and Welfare plans to expand the "contract-based regional essential physician system" to fill gaps until service-based regional physicians are produced. It is speeding up institutional improvements by concurrently soliciting new participating local governments and revamping compensation for essential care.
On top of this, concerns are mounting over disruptions in the supply of medical consumables due to the Middle East war. The Ministry of Health and Welfare has implemented a notice banning hoarding of medical supplies such as syringes as it moves to manage supply chains. With the vaccine management controversy added, calls to hold the minister accountable are spreading.