POISON SYRUP STALKS CHILDREN

THE tragic death of 23 children in Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan recently after consuming contaminated cough syrup has exposed the chinks in India's drug regulatory policy, surveillance and vigilance system, and the state of public health.

- KAVITA BAJELI-DATT @ NEW DELHI

People dying due to drugs containing diethylene glycol (DEG)-an industrial solvent used in antifreeze, paints, brake fluids, and plastics is rare but not unprecedented. Such tragedies have been reported in the past in India as well as abroad.

India's first case of DEG deaths was recorded in 1972, when 15 children died in Madras (now Chennai). In 1986, 14 people died in Mumbai; in 1988, 11 died in Bihar; and in 1998, as many as 33 children lost their lives in Gurgaon, while 150 children were hospitalised with acute kidney failure in Delhi.

Between December 2019 and January 2020, at least 12 children under five years of age died in Jammu-again due to contaminated cough syrup.

India-made cough syrups came under global scanner after they were linked to deaths of 70 children in Gambia, 20 in Uzbekistan, and 12 in Cameron during 2022-23. As India's reputation as the 'pharmacy of the world' suffered a severe blow, the country made it mandatory for cough syrups intended for export to be tested at government-approved laboratories.

However, after the initial noise and some regulatory changes, the issue subsided. The recent deaths in Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan jolted the authorities again and raised concerns globally, with the World Health Organization seeking to know if these medicines were shipped from India to other countries.

While the UN body expressed concern over the regulatory gap in DEG screening for the domestic market, the Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation (CDSCO), the apex regulatory body, accepted that not one, but three medicines had the toxic DEG.

No lessons learned