The National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control, NAFDAC, has alerted the public about five contaminated syrups allegedly going around in World Health Organisation, WHO, regions.
The notification is contained in a public alert No. 037/2023, signed by the Director-General of the agency, Prof Mojisola Adeyeye on Monday in Abuja.
The agency listed the WHO regions to include: America, Eastern Mediterranean, South-East Asia, and Western Pacific.
NAFDAC also said that the five oral liquid dosage forms (syrup and suspension) were also detected in the Maldives and Pakistan, and that some of the affected products have also been detected in Belize, Fiji and Lao People’s Democratic Republic.
The agency listed the syrups as: ALERGO Syrup, EMIDONE Suspension, MUCORID Syrup, ULCOFIN Suspension and ZINCELL Syrup, adding that “a total of 23 batches of the products are affected and the stated manufacturer is PHARMIX LABORATORIES (PVT.) LTD (Pakistan)”.
The NAFDAC boss said that as a precautionary measure, DRAP had instructed PHARMIX LABORATORIES to stop production of all oral liquid dosage medicines and issued a Recall Alert for the five different oral dosage manufactured by the company.
She revealed that Diethylene Glycol and Ethylene Glycol are toxic to humans when consumed and can prove fatal.
According to her, toxic effects can include abdominal pain, vomiting, diarrhoea, inability to pass urine, headache, altered mental state, and acute kidney injury which may lead to death.
The NAFDAC boss stated that manufacturers of liquid dosage forms, especially syrups that contain excipients, are at risk of contamination with EG/DEG such as glycol, sorbitol, and/or glycerin/glycerol.
NAFDAC alerts Nigerians on substandard, contaminated syrup