More drugs may be linked to meningitis outbreak: FDA

Two other drugs made by the Massachusetts pharmacy at the center of a deadly meningitis outbreak may be linked to the disease, U.S. health regulators said on Monday, potentially widening the scope of the health crisis.

The Food and Drug Administration said it was looking into reports of a patient with possible meningitis who received an injection of a different steroid than the one found to have caused 15 deaths. It also said two transplant patients were infected with the rare fungus linked to the meningitis outbreak after receiving a heart drug also made by the New England Compounding Center (NECC) of Framingham, Massachusetts.

Nine more people have been diagnosed with fungal meningitis linked to possibly tainted vials of the injected steroid methylprednisolone, bringing the number of cases to 212, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). A Tennessee woman among these cases filed a lawsuit on Monday against NECC seeking $15 million in damages.

The patient identified by the FDA as potentially having meningitis received an injection for pain of the steroid triamcinolone, also supplied by NECC.

The FDA said its investigation of that patient and the two who received the heart drug during surgery was ongoing, and it cautioned that any injectable drugs made by NECC, including those intended for use in eyes, are of "significant concern."

The FDA has not confirmed that these three infections were caused by NECC products.

NECC said in a statement that it was reviewing the new information from the FDA. "We continue to cooperate with the FDA, as we are with the CDC and the Board of Registration in Pharmacy of the Massachusetts Department of Public Health," it said.

The meningitis outbreak expanded to 15 states on Monday as Pennsylvania reported its first case.

The Pennsylvania patient, who received the epidural steroid injection in July, was being treated in a hospital, the Pennsylvania Department of Health said.

The nine new cases include the one in Pennsylvania, five in Michigan, two in Ohio, and one in Minnesota.

TENNESSEE SUSPENDS NECC LICENSE

All but eight of the 23 states that received suspect medications from the Massachusetts specialist pharmacy have reported at least one case of fungal meningitis, a rare and deadly disease that has proven difficult to treat.

The suspect lots of steroid were shipped to 76 facilities in 23 states, including two locations in Pennsylvania.

"We have been working directly with the clinics to ensure that patients who received these injections are monitored and receive any necessary follow-up," said Acting Pennsylvania Secretary of Health Michael Wolf.

Health authorities have said that nearly 14,000 people nationwide have received injections from the potentially contaminated medication originally linked to the outbreak.