The Department of Health has come under fire for its delayed announcement of an incident in which a doctor gave a patient the wrong vaccine, citing privacy concerns.

On February 23, a patient was supposed to receive a flu jab, but was instead given a tetanus vaccination by a doctor at a clinic.

Clinic staff noticed the mistake during a vaccine stock count, and immediately contacted the patient to apologize.

The patient suffered no adverse effects after a check-up, and was given the flu shot.

A department spokeswoman said the initial investigation showed the staff did not spot anything wrong when verifying information of the patient and the vaccine.

The department did not acknowledge the mistake until it received media inquiries.

``In order to protect the patient's privacy, the Department of Health would not disclose personal information before having the patient's agreement,'' it said in a statement. When asked why the department did not disclose the blunder earlier, the spokeswoman said the department had assessed the impact of the case on public health.

Civic Party lawmaker Kwok Ka-ki, a surgeon, criticized the department for not announcing the serious mistake, and asked it to review the storage method of vaccines.

``There is a major fault in the system within the Department of Health and the Hospital Authority. Giving a wrong injection both vaccination or medication either by intramuscular or intravenous method poses a very serious risk,'' Kwok said.

He added it was plain ``luck'' that the patient did not suffer from complications, as the consequences of administering wrong jabs such as antibiotics could include death if the patient happened to be hypersensitive to the drug.

A spokesman for the Hong Kong Alliance of Patients' Organizations, Tsang Kin-ping, said reporting the incident was the more responsible action.

Pierre Chan Pui-yin, chairman of the Public Doctors' Association, said: ``In my understanding, the privacy of the patient is prioritized over public interest. It could only be the other way round if we are talking about major cases such as infectious disease or those involving a lawsuit.''

Medical functional constituency lawmaker Leung Ka- lau said the department's explanation of protecting the patient is unconvincing.

But he said it was difficult for him to judge whether the department should have proactively disclosed the case.

``The current types of events that are required to be reported are only added to the list because that type of blunder happened, and the public pressure has made them reach that consensus to report it next time,'' he said.

''Medical incidents are so complicated and every case differs. It is very difficult to draw the line on what is necessary to be reported, and what's not.''