The Federal Emergency Management Agency has warned states not to use COVID-19 testing supplies it bought under a $10.2 million contract after a ProPublica investigation last week showed the vendor was providing contaminated and unusable mini soda bottles.
A FEMA spokeswoman said the agency is working with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to analyze test tubes filled with saline and sold to the government by Fillakit LLC, whose warehouse is near Houston.
A later story in The Wall Street Journal raised similar allegations. The Journal first reported on Friday that the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general is now looking into the contractor. Fillakit owner Paul Wexler previously told the Journal that allegations of unsanitary conditions were baseless and came from a disgruntled former employee.
Teresa Green, a retired science teacher and former Fillakit employee, told ProPublica that she spoke with someone identified as a “special agent” with Homeland Security who told her he was looking into Fillakit’s operations. Green declined to elaborate.
A spokesperson for the Homeland Security inspector general’s office said, “As a matter of policy, we do not confirm or deny open investigations.”