An NHS worker who used his access to the national vaccination system to create and sell thousands of fraudulent Covid-19 vaccination records has been jailed.
Waqas Hanif, 28, and Touqir Nasir, 31, both from Luton, were prosecuted following a joint investigation by the National Crime Agency and NHS England.
Investigators discovered more than 2,000 fraudulent vaccination records were created between June and October 2021 at Kingsway Health Centre in Luton, where Hanif worked as a vaccination programme care co-ordinator.
Fake vaccinations sold for up to £150
Hanif had administrator access to the NHS vaccination system and charged customers between £80 and £150 to falsely record that they had received two doses of a Covid vaccine.
Investigators identified 2,663 suspicious entries associated with the health centre.
Of those, 1,875 were connected to five IP addresses linked to Hanif’s home.
When NCA officers searched his home in January 2022 they recovered his NHS identification card, NHS documents and £7,000 in cash.
Images discovered on Hanif’s phone also contained personal information relating to around 340 patients.
Officers separately seized £136,405 in cash from a safe deposit box rented by Hanif.
More than £56,000 paid into bank account
Investigators also established that Nasir received more than £56,000 into a bank account opened under his former name.
The account contained large numbers of smaller deposits which investigators suspected were payments for fraudulent vaccination records.
Hanif pleaded guilty to offences under the Computer Misuse Act, Fraud Act and Proceeds of Crime Act, while Nasir admitted fraud and an offence under the Proceeds of Crime Act.
At Luton Crown Court on Thursday, September 3, Hanif was sentenced to three years in prison.
Nasir received a 10-month prison sentence suspended for one year and was ordered to comply with a six-month curfew.
NCA Deputy Director Paul Foster said the pair had “cynically abused our healthcare system for financial gain” at a time when the country was dealing with the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic.
He added that the investigation had helped prevent organised criminals from further undermining the UK’s pandemic response.
