A new investigation by the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and Gambian health officials suggested a strong link between deaths of children in the Gambian and cough syrups manufactured in India that were allegedly contaminated.
In October, the World Health Organization (WHO) issued an alert stating that four cough syrups being supplied to The Gambia by India-based Maiden Pharmaceuticals Ltd were of substandard quality and claimed they were responsible for the deaths of several children in the Gambia. Was attached.
According to the CDC report released on Friday, drugs contaminated with certain chemicals were seen as the reason for the death of children. “This investigation strongly suggests that drugs contaminated with diethylene glycol [DEG] or ethylene glycol [EG] The report states that an Acute Kidney Injury (AKI) cluster has formed in children after being imported into The Gambia.
“Patients with DEG poisoning may experience a number of signs and symptoms, including altered mental status, headache, and gastrointestinal symptoms; however, the most frequent manifestation is AKI, characterized by oliguria (low urine output) or anuria, which is characterized by 1 Progresses over -3. days to renal failure (indicated by elevated serum creatinine and blood urea nitrogen),” the report further read.
According to the CDC, last August the Gambia’s Ministry of Health (MOH) was contacted for assistance in identifying the disease (several cases of acute kidney injury and death in children), describing the epidemiology, and possible causative factors. and their sources were identified year. The report also states that in previous DEG outbreaks, manufacturers were suspected of substituting DEGs with more expensive, pharmaceutical-grade solvents.
“Among the reports of AKI linked to DEG-contaminated medical products, this is the first in which the DEG-contaminated drugs were imported into the country instead of being manufactured domestically,” it said. It further said that the drugs for export may be subject to less. Stricter regulatory standards than for home use.
“At the same time, low-resource countries may not have the human and financial resources to monitor and test imported drugs,” it said. Union Minister of State for Health Bharti Praveen Pawar, in his reply to the Lok Sabha on February 3, had said that after testing, the samples of cough syrup were found to be of standard quality. Pawar, in a written reply to a question, had said that the samples were found negative for both Diethylene Glycol (DEG) and Ethylene Glycol (EG).
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