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TN shuts down pharma firm linked to cough syrup deaths
Chennai: The Tamil Nadu government on Monday revoked the manufacturing licence of Sresan Pharmaceuticals that produced the now-banned contaminated cough syrup Coldrif, which is linked to the deaths of several children in Madhya Pradesh, an official statement said
Chennai: The Tamil Nadu government on Monday revoked the manufacturing licence of Sresan Pharmaceuticals that produced the now-banned contaminated cough syrup Coldrif, which is linked to the deaths of several children in Madhya Pradesh, an official statement said.
The Tamil Nadu health department has also ordered comprehensive inspections across all pharmaceutical manufacturing units in the state, with officials saying statewide inspections were underway.
The decisions come amid a massive outrage across the country over the deaths of at least 22 children from Madhya Pradesh, mostly residents of Parasia village in Chhindwara district, over a month due to suspected renal failure after consuming the contaminated cough syrup. Some other children are currently undergoing treatment at hospitals in Nagpur in Maharashtra.
Coldrif, manufactured in Tamil Nadu’s Kancheepuram district, was found to be dangerously adulterated with toxic substance, diethylene glycol or DEG. The DEG concentration was found to be over 48% in Coldrif compared to the permissible limit of just 0.1%.
“The drug manufacturing license of Sresan Pharmaceuticals has been completely cancelled, and the company has been closed. Orders have been given to conduct a detailed inspection of other drug manufacturing companies located in Tamil Nadu,” the state health department said in a statement.
The pharma company owner G Ranganathan was arrested from his Chennai residence by a special investigation team (SIT) of the Madhya Pradesh police on October 9. A Parasia court has since sent Ranganathan to a 10-day police custody.
The Tamil Nadu government has also suspended two state drug inspectors in Kancheepuram over dereliction of duty for failing to inspect the pharma unit after 2022.
After Madhya Pradesh’s drug authority wrote to its Tamil Nadu counterpart on October 1, the southern state investigated and found contamination after testing samples from the same batch of the cough syrup. The state government informed the same to the Centre, Madhya Pradesh, and other states and UTs, including Odisha and Puducherry, where the cough syrup was distributed to.
Earlier, the Tamil Nadu government had issued a “stop production” order to the pharmaceutical company on October 3. A show cause notice was issued to Ranganathan and the firm’s analytical chemist K Maheswari on October 7.
Meanwhile, the Madhya Pradesh government has suspended drug inspectors Gaurav Sharma (Chhindwara) and Sharad Kumar Jain (Jabalpur), as well as deputy director of food and drug administration, Shobhit Costa, and transferred state’s drug controller Dinesh Maurya.
In the wake of children deaths after consuming the contaminated cough syrup, the Union government, in an advisory dated October 3, urged states and UTs to promote the judicious prescribing and dispensing of cough syrups for children, noting that most acute illnesses in the paediatric age group are self-limiting and resolve without pharmacological intervention. The advisory further states that cough and cold medications should not be prescribed or dispensed to children below two years of age and are generally not recommended for those under five.
