Bundaberg has attracted national media attention in 2005 due to the alleged incompetence of Bundaberg Base Hospital surgical director Jayant Patel, who has been implicated in the deaths of up to 87 patients.
Bundaberg also was the location of another health-related disaster in booster shot, all the children became very ill, and 12 died. Initial fears that the TAT process had failed to neutralize the diphtheria toxin in this instance were allayed when an investigation by an Australian Royal Commission, headed by future Nobel Prize winning immunologist Macfarlane Burnett, found that the vaccine had become contaminated by Staphylococcus aureus during the first round of injections. During the two week gap, these bacteria had multiplied in the vaccine, producing a different toxin (see toxic shock syndrome). As a result of this finding, the Royal Commission issued a strong recommendation, adopted by all major manufacturers, that all vaccines packaged in containers containing multiple doses incorporate an antibacterial preservative. After testing of various compounds for toxicity and compatibility with the vaccine, the optimal preservative was determined to be thimerosal, which, ironically, has now become controversial due to questions of its own toxicity.
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