Indian pharma company halts cough syrup production after Gambia child fatalities

India has halted all production at Maiden Pharmaceuticals’ main factory near New Delhi after a WHO report that the company’s cough syrups exported to the Gambia may be linked to the deaths of dozens of children there.
The recent incident which has claimed the lives of 69 children, according to WHO, has come as a blow to the industry whose exports more than doubled in the last decade to hit $24.5 billion last fiscal year. Indian pharmaceutical companies are said to supply 45% of all generic medicines to Africa. Indian authorities inspected the Maiden factory in the state of Haryana four times this month and suspended all manufacturing activities there on Tuesday (11 October) “on grounds of deficiencies found in location inspection“. Haryana’s health minister Anil Vij said in a statement that an inspection conducted jointly by state and federal officials found 12 „flaws”. Maiden broke rules “across its manufacturing and testing activities,” Indian regulators found.
Last week, the company said it was “shocked to hear media reports regarding the deaths and deeply saddened by this incident“. This came after the WHO issued a global alert over four of Maiden’s cough syrups, warning that they could be linked to acute kidney injuries and the children’s deaths in July, August and September. The global health organization also warned the products “may have been distributed, through informal markets, to other countries and regions” besides The Gambia. A top Indian health official, who declined to be named, said the government would not tolerate wrongdoing but that it was important to find out what exactly happened in the Gambia. A preliminary report released by the Gambian police said the cough syrups were imported to the West African country by a US-based company. The report also said that the majority of the 50,000 bottles of the contaminated syrups that were imported into the country had now been seized.