Eight people were sentenced to jail terms Friday for selling fake rabies vaccines that contributed to the death of a five-year old boy in southwest China, a local court said Monday.

The Intermediate People's Court of Laibin City in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region sentenced Zhang Dazhi and seven other people to jail terms of up to 30 months.

The court said the eight sold more than 530 doses of fake rabies vaccines between August and December last year. The fake vaccines were mostly water.

Police began an investigation after a five-year-old boy died of rabies on Dec. 10 last year. The boy had received six injections of the fake vaccine at a village-level clinic in Laibin.

The court also partially blamed the victim's parents for the child's death, because they were slow to seek medical treatment for him.

The eight criminals paid a total of 160,000 yuan (nearly 24,000 U.S. dollars) in compensation to the boy's family.

Further investigation found that 1,656 people in Guangxi had received the fake rabies vaccinations.

Local authorities had given proper vaccines to 1,649 of them by June this year and no further deaths had been reported.

Police are still hunting for a suspect believed to be involved in the incident.

Go to Forum >>0 Comments