Authorities in Uzbekistan on Wednesday said eighteen children have died from a cough syrup named syrup Doc-1 Max prepared by an Indian company, Marion Biotech, a company based in Noida, in Uttar Pradesh. The 70 deaths reported in The Gambia, earlier this year, were linked to another Indian company called Maiden Pharmaceuticals in New Delhi whose drug formula, WHO confirmed had diethylene glycol and ethylene glycol.
India’s NDTV quoted Uzbekistan’s Health Ministry saying the medicine administered to the kids for cold therapy had ethylene glycol in it, the same ingredient connected to the acute kidney injuries in The Gambia that killed seventy children while leaving ten affected.
Uzbekistan is in the same region as Afghanistan, thousands of miles away from Gambia. But the deaths are similar as are the victims–children! Indianexpress wrote, “Maiden has denied the allegations. Its manufacturing unit in Sonepat was shut down by the Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation for alleged irregularities in processes. But India maintains that sufficient clinical details to establish causality between the deaths and the consumption of medicine hasn’t been shared by the country or the WHO that raised an alert in October linking the deaths to Maiden’s four syrups.”
Uzbekistan’s Health Ministry continued its statement that the chemical culprit, ethylene glycol “is toxic and consuming 1-2ml/kg of 95% concentrated solution can cause vomiting, fainting, convulsions, cardiovascular problems and acute kidney failure,” Indianexpress reports Thursday.
According to Reuters ,”earlier this month, India told the WHO that tests of samples from the same batches of syrups that were sent to Gambia were compliant with government specifications.” But the world health body wasn’t convinced, adding, “lab analysis confirmed “unacceptable” amounts of diethylene glycol and ethylene glycol in the medicines made by Maiden, which can be toxic and lead to acute kidney injury.”
A select committee of Gambian law makers isn’t forgiving the Indian drug manufacturers whose distributions, reports said in July, were not for consumption on Indian soil. But they were okayed for easy dispatch to both Gambia and Uzbekistan.