China recalls drug that has sickened dozens

	Tweet

China has banned an antibiotic treatment and ordered a recall of the drug after patients in five provinces developed symptoms ranging from nausea to kidney and liver damage, state media reported on Friday.

The use of fake and poor-quality products has killed dozens of people in China in recent years and has sparked widespread public fury about food and drug safety. Chinese media have blamed the frequent scandals on businesses obsessed with making profits and on lax official supervision.

The northwestern province of Qinghai last week first reported 14 cases of “adverse drug reactions” to the Clindamycin Phosphate Glucose Injection produced by a company in the eastern province of Anhui, the Beijing News said.

"Anhui’s drug watchdog has asked its counterparts across the country to halt the sale and use of the injection,” the newspaper said, “It has also ordered the company to suspend production of the injection and recall all the doses it has made since June.”

The drug is used to treat bacterial infections, it said, without giving a possible reason for the adverse reactions that were also reported in four other provinces.

Nine patients in the northeastern province of Heilongjiang were in a “stable but still dangerous” condition after suffering symptoms that also included diarrhea, vomiting and loss of consciousness, the newspaper said.

Months earlier, local media exposed a bogus drug scandal that had killed 11 people in the southern province of Guangdong after they received injections of fake Armillarisni-A made by a Heilongjiang company, whose executives were detained and its license withdrawn.

RELATED STORIES:
Dangerous low blood sugar linked to sex drugs   Prescriptions for teens and young adults on the rise   Panel backs new warnings on ADHD drugs   Improper medication use varies widely in Europe   Glaxo warns of birth defect from antiepileptic drug   Some Ethnic Groups More Susceptible to Adverse Drug Reactions   Shortfall in malaria drug causing deaths--MSF   Popular Arthritis Drug May Disrupt Heart Rhythm, UB Research Finds   US reviewer says depression drugs, suicide linked   US warns about risks of Boehringer AIDS drug   Popular colorectal cancer drug may cause permanent nerve damage   About 1.2 million people use stimulants for non-medical reasons, government finds

Comments

[ + Post Your Own ]

Now you're in the public comment zone. What follows is not Armenian Medical Network's stuff; it comes from other people and we don't vouch for it. A reminder: By using this Web site you agree to accept our Terms of Service. Click here to read the Rules of Engagement.

There are no comments for this entry yet. [ + Comment here + ]