Cough syrup deaths: Maiden Pharma denies tampering with tests in probe of cough syrup deaths

India’s Maiden Prescription drugs, whose cough syrups have been linked to the deaths of youngsters in Gambia, on Saturday denied it had tampered with check samples or bribed officers to take action, as alleged in a criticism underneath investigation by native well being officers.

An investigator with the state of Haryana’s Meals and Drug Administration informed Reuters on Friday he was near ending a probe into whether or not a state drug regulator was bribed to modify samples, examined by the Indian authorities, that contradicted the World Well being Group’s findings of poisonous substances within the cough syrups.

“I’ve by no means modified the pattern,” Maiden founder Naresh Kumar Goyal informed Reuters. “There isn’t a proof and no proof in opposition to us. I’ve not given a bribe.”

He mentioned that neither he nor any consultant of his firm had been referred to as to look in entrance of the investigator, Gagandeep Singh, joint director of the state company.

Goyal mentioned a competitor was behind the criticism however didn’t title them.

Singh declined to touch upon Goyal’s assertion. The WHO has linked syrups made by Maiden to the deaths of 70 youngsters in Gambia final yr, however India’s authorities says subsequent assessments at an Indian authorities laboratory confirmed the syrups weren’t poisonous. Singh informed Reuters on Friday that his company had obtained a complete and exhaustive criticism that the state’s drug regulator, in return for a bribe of fifty million Indian rupees ($600,000), helped to modify check samples earlier than they had been delivered to the Indian laboratory.

The regulator, Manmohan Taneja, didn’t reply to telephone calls and digital messages in search of remark. He informed Reuters in October that the criticism behind the bribery probe was a “faux criticism from a faux particular person” and that “anybody can ship any faux criticism in opposition to anybody”.

Reuters was unable to independently set up that any bribes had been paid.

Goyal mentioned his manufacturing unit, which was closed by the federal government in October 2022 after the Gambia deaths got here to gentle, was now underneath renovation and he had requested the authorities to examine the power in order that it could possibly be reopened.

“There was no fault within the manufacturing unit, however since they identified some issues, now we have rectified them,” he mentioned. “We try our greatest, we’re pursuing the matter with the involved officers. That is all we will do.”

India’s well being ministry didn’t reply to a request for remark.

Two sources with direct information of the matter mentioned the Indian authorities was in no hurry to reopen any of the three Indian pharmaceutical factories, together with Maiden’s manufacturing unit in Haryana state, linked to a minimum of 141 deaths since final yr in Gambia, Uzbekistan and Cameroon. One of many sources added that no determination was seemingly earlier than subsequent Might’s normal election, given the chance of a unfavourable public response.