A suspicious package was found earlier last week at Wockhardt’s Wrexham facility causing a temporary manufacturing pause. The site has now been "made safe" after an investigation by the local police.
In a public statement, the company noted, “We can confirm that the investigation on the suspicious package received today has been concluded. Given that staff safety is our main priority manufacturing was temporarily paused whilst this took place safely.
“We can now confirm that the package was made safe and staff are now being allowed back into the facility. This temporary suspension of manufacturing has in no way affected our production schedule and we are grateful to the authorities and experts for their swift response and resolution of the incident.”
The company had previously partially evacuated the site after it received the suspicious package at its site and informed all relevant authorities immediately and local North Wales Police force said officers rushed to the Wrexham Industrial Estate to deal with the incident. There are no reports of any injuries however. The factory, located at Wrexham Industrial Estate in North Wales, operates a fill-finish production line for the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine against Covid-19 after an agreement was struck in August last year with the UK Government. Local reports suggested that a bomb disposal unit had also been deployed as part of the investigations at the unit.
"We are currently dealing with an ongoing incident on the Wrexham Industrial Estate. The roads are currently closed and we would ask the public to avoid the area until further notice," a police statement said.
The Wrexham plant has the capability to produce around 300 million doses of the vaccine a year. The Welsh government stressed that there had been "no adverse effects" on the coronavirus vaccine roll-out as a result of the security alert. The UK government has reserved one fill-finish production line at Wockhardt UK for its exclusive use for 18 months in order to guarantee the supply of vaccines required to fight against Covid-19, the company had confirmed during a visit by UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson to the Welsh facility last November.
He had noted, “Our agreement with Wockhardt is a significant milestone for the British life science industry and will help produce the vaccines this country needs.”
In the UK, Wockhardt claims to be one of the largest suppliers into the National Health Service (NHS) and has had a presence for over 20 years at Wrexham, where it employs over 400 people at its 612,000 square feet hi-tech manufacturing facility.
