JAKARTA: Indonesia has halted sales of medicinal syrup after 99 children died of acute kidney injuries this year.
The ban will remain until the health ministry completes an investigation into the cause of the illness, with 206 cases recorded so far in mostly children under six years old. Authorities are looking into the potential toxicity of ingredients used in the liquid drugs.
“To protect our children, who are most heavily affected by this, we decided to issue this policy,” Health Ministry spokesperson Mohammad Syahril said in a statement late Wednesday. Cases have been surging since late August, he added.
The World Health Organization has warned that a deadly batch of cough syrups linked to deaths in The Gambia could have been distributed to other countries.
The liquid drugs made by the Indian company Maiden Pharmaceuticals Ltd are not licensed to be sold in Indonesia, and the country has banned the contaminants found in the Gambia cases. But the local food and drug agency warned that the contaminants might be found in glycerin or propylene glycol, which are solvents used in syrup-based medicines.
The Indonesian government found that 15 out of 18 liquid paracetamol and other syrup medicines that it tested contain ethylene glycol as a dissolving agent, which could be toxic, Deputy Health Minister Dante Saksono Harbuwono was cited as saying by Detik.com.
The Gambia and India are investigating the deaths from acute kidney injury in the west African country thought to be linked to the cough syrups made byMaiden Pharmaceuticals.
The World Health Organization has said that laboratory analysis of four Maiden products — Promethazine Oral Solution, Kofexmalin Baby Cough Syrup, Makoff Baby Cough Syrup and Magrip N Cold Syrup — had “unacceptable” amounts of diethylene glycol and ethylene glycol, which can be toxic and cause acute kidney injury.
Indian health authorities announced a production halt at the Maiden Pharmaceuticals factory in Sonepat in northern India on Oct 12.
The deaths in The Gambia, the worst involving drugs made in India, are a blow to an industry whose exports more than doubled in the last decade to hit $24.5 billion in the fiscal year through March.
Known as the “pharmacy of the world”, India supplies 45% of all generic medicines used in Africa.
