Gambia hires US law firm to consider action on toxic Indian cough syrup,
minister says
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[June 02, 2023]
By Pap Saine and Edward McAllister
BANJUL (Reuters) - Gambia has hired a U.S. law firm to explore legal
action after a government-backed investigation found that contaminated
medicines from India were "very likely" to have caused the deaths of
children last year, the justice minister told Reuters.
At least 70 children in Gambia, most under 5 years old, died from acute
kidney injury between June and October.
Local doctors suspected cough syrups imported from India were the likely
culprit, Reuters reported earlier this year, and tests by the World
Health Organization (WHO) confirmed the presence of lethal toxins,
sparking a global hunt for contaminated medicines.
Gambian Justice Minister Dawda Jallow told Reuters legal action was one
option under consideration by the government, the first sign of
potential international litigation over the deaths. Jallow did not say
who would be the target of potential legal proceedings or name the law
firm hired to help.
The medicines linked to the children's deaths were made by Indian drug
maker Maiden Pharmaceuticals, which denied wrongdoing. Tests by the WHO
found that the Maiden cough syrups contained the lethal toxins
diethylene glycol (DEG) and ethylene glycol (EG), used in car brake
fluid. India's government has said its own tests on the drugs found no
toxins.
India's health ministry and Maiden did not respond to requests for
comment on Gambia's possible legal action. The WHO declined to comment.
Indian officials have said the WHO failed to prove a causal link to the
Gambia deaths, accusing the agency of denigrating its $41 billion
pharmaceutical industry. However, cough syrups made by a second Indian
drugmaker have been linked to the deaths of 19 children in Uzbekistan.
India has since made drug testing mandatory for cough syrups before
export.
CAUSALITY REPORT
Gambia's justice ministry is considering its options after completion of
a new government-commissioned causality assessment by a panel of
international experts, Jallow said.
Reuters has seen a copy of the report, which was presented to President
Adama Barrow in April but has not been made public.
In it, experts said they analyzed 56 of the cases of acute kidney
injury. Of those, they found 22 were "very likely" to have died from DEG
or EG poisoning after taking Maiden products.
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Gambian Justice Minister Dawda Jallow
stands outside the International Court of Justice where the court
ruled that Gambia's case seeking to hold Myanmar accountable for
alleged genocide against the Rohingya Muslim minority group can
proceed in The Hague, Netherlands July 22, 2022. REUTERS/Toby
Sterling/File Photo
The panel could not confirm the
cause of death in another 30 cases but said it was "highly
suggestive" they were killed by DEG and EG. It said there was not
enough evidence in four other cases.
Doctors were able to carry out autopsies on just two of the
patients. The pathology from both was consistent with DEG and EG
poisoning, the report said. Of all the medicines tested after the
deaths, only Maiden's were shown to be toxic, it said.
DEG and EG can be used by unscrupulous actors as a cheap substitute
for propylene glycol, a key ingredient in syrupy medicines,
according to several pharmaceutical manufacturing experts.
Reuters could not determine if Indian authorities had seen the
causality report.
It is the latest piece of a months-long investigation into the
deaths, which raised concerns among global health officials about
lax regulation in India's drug sector and oversight of
pharmaceutical raw materials worldwide. Many of the countries India
supplies, including Gambia, have no means of testing imported drugs.
The WHO has said it is continuing to investigate the source of
contaminated cough syrups in Gambia, Uzbekistan and several other
countries, but has been frustrated by a lack of information
regarding Maiden's drugs. A key middleman in the supply chain of
those medicines is still unknown, Reuters found.
Gambia's Minister Dawda said the causality assessment and the
justice ministry's recommendations would be made public within six
months.
Gambia is planning to build a testing facility for imported drugs
with support from the World Bank, the bank told Reuters.
(Additional reporting by Shilpa Jamkhandikar, Writing by Edward
McAllister; Edited by Sara Ledwith, Michele Gershberg and Bill
Berkrot)
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