Misuse of prescription medicines and skin lightening products

POLICE in India have arrested the owner of a pharmaceutical company that manufactured a cough syrup connected to the deaths of at least 17 children in the country.

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The owner of Tamil Nadu based Sresan Pharmaceuticals was arrested and faces having its license revoked pending a decision by the federal health ministry.

Initial tests by authorities in India say that the test samples of Coldrif contained diethylene glycol (DEG) - a highly toxic industrial solvent and that the Tamil Nadu Drugs Control Department shows that cough syrup was manufactured in unhygienic factory conditions.

Although there are no exports of the medicine in question, there is a need for Sri Lanka to be alert for medicines that come, not only from India but other countries with regulatory issues, so as to avoid any such tragedy.

According to foreign media reports the World Health Organization has confirmed from India that three contaminated syrups had been identified, and none had been exported and the country had a "regulatory gap" in screening locally-sold syrup medicines.