Israel ‘finds’ historic Pfizer agreement after media inquiry

Israel’s Health Ministry Friday managed to recover its historic vaccine agreement with Pfizer after telling a Jerusalem District Court that not only had it disappeared, but the ministry was also not sure it had even been signed. 

The agreement, in which Pfizer agreed to supply Israel with free experimental COVID-19 vaccines in exchange for data, marked the beginning of Israel’s aggressive vaccine campaign, which the rest of the world followed soon after. Israel’s government was the first to implement coerced vaccinations, several months before other Western countries like Canada and Australia, and nearly a full year before countries accustomed to human rights violations such as Iran and Venezuela. 

The agreement was made public in January 2021 though it remained heavily redacted. 

During a hearing last week following the Ministry of Health’s (MoH) failure to respond to a Freedom of Information (FOI) request from a human rights organization, the MoH told the court it was not able to locate the agreement and was not sure it had been signed. 

The FOI request, brought by Vigilance for Human Rights, aimed to find out if the agreement had indeed been signed by MoH head Hazi Levy and a representative from Pfizer. 

“We did not find a signed agreement,” said attorney Ahava Berman on behalf of MoH, according to Kan 11. “We searched all places, including the CEO’s office and the legal department.” 

In a written statement to the court, the MoH claimed that “a comprehensive inquiry has been made with many officials at the Ministry of Health to clarify whether the agreement was signed or not. Because of the government exchange and the relevant bodies in the office, the Ministry did not find out whether the agreement was signed or not.” 

Less than a day after Kan 11 reached out to the MoH for comment, the ministry notified the channel it had located the document. 

"The Ministry would like to emphasize that an epidemiological evidence cooperation agreement was originally signed with the Pfizer company, it exists in the Ministry and the signed copy was delivered to the court. The initial answer, given to the court, should not have been given as it is, and for that we are sorry," the ministry said in a statement.