Poison in teething drug kills 84 Nigerian children

[Sarge]

LAGOS, Nigeria (CNN) -- At least 84 Nigerian children have died after ingesting teething medicine that contained a solvent typically found in antifreeze, the country's health minister said Friday.


The My Pikin teething medicine has been reomved from shops in Nigeria.

Some 111 babies and children have been sickened since November by the tainted batch of My Pikin, which was found to contain diethylene glycol, which is used in some antifreeze and brake fluid.

Tests on the teething formula showed high concentrations of diethylene glycol, Health Minister Babtunde Osotimehin said in a statement released Friday.

Exposure to the solvent can damage the kidney, heart and nervous system, Osotimehin said, and it can be fatal.

The dead ranged from age 2 months to 7 years, he said. "The death of any Nigerian child is a great loss to the nation," he said.

Several officials with pharmaceutical company Barewa Pharmaceutical Ltd have been charged with negligence.

And the Nigeria National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control, which is investigating the issue with the Ministry of Health, has shut the drug maker down.

Former officials of the company could not be reached for comment.

The food and drugs agency has said it believes the company thought it was buying propylene glycol, a normal ingredient in the teething medicine.

The government has asked that all My Pikin teething formula be returned; however, it was not immediately clear if that had been done.

Symptoms of diethylene glycol exposure include: abdominal pain; nausea or vomiting; dizziness; drowsiness; confusion; and decreased or lack of production of urine.
http://us.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/africa/02/06/nigeria.poison/index.html

[Sarge]

Now I know Nigeria for 2 things..

The 419 scams and kids dying from meds.

Breasts,

[FORD]

This article has some additional details on this sad story.....

Nigeria: 84 children dead from teething formula
By EDWARD HARRIS
Associated Press Writer

LAGOS, Nigeria — Nigerian health workers hunted down errant bottles of a poisonous teething formula Friday as the government reported that 84 infants and children have now died after swallowing a syrup laced with a chemical normally found in antifreeze.

The children were stricken with fever, convulsions, diarrhea and vomiting, and were unable to urinate after being given the My Pikin Baby Teething Mixture.

The dead ranged from 2 months to 7 years old, the Health Ministry said, adding that at least 111 children in all have been sickened since the tainted batch hit store shelves in mid-November.

"The death of any Nigerian child is a great loss to the nation," Health Minister Babatunde Oshotimehin said in a statement. "The federal ministry of health sincerely regrets this painful incidence and sympathizes with the nation and the families."

Health officials said in early December that 34 children had died and stores were returning stocks of the formula meant to stop teething pain.

But health workers were now pressing to collect already-purchased bottles of the sweet-tasting medicine, said Marshal Gundu, a spokesman for the Ministry of Health. He said parents of the affected children were being interviewed and an epidemiological survey was under way.

Health officials said they don't know how many bottles of the bad formula were made or remain in circulation, so it was not clear if the death toll could rise further.

Nigeria is a vast, chaotic country of 140 million people, and bottles of the teething formula could easily go undiscovered by authorities. Nigeria also has a long history of poor enforcement of its own regulations, with corruption rampant among police and government officials.

It was unclear if any of the teething formula had been shipped overseas, but most products made in Nigeria are designed for domestic sale in Africa's largest market.

Many bottles of the paracetemol-based formula were found to have a high concentration of diethylene glycol, a chemical commonly found in antifreeze and brake fluid and sometimes used illegally as a cheaper alternative to glycerin, which thickens toothpaste. Exposure can cause kidney and liver damage and may be fatal.

An official with manufacturer Barewa Pharmaceuticals Ltd. apparently procured diethylene glycol from an unregistered chemical dealer in a sprawling slum near the main dump in Lagos, the National Agency for Food, Drug Administration and Control has said.

Several officials of the Lagos-based pharmaceutical maker are under arrest, along with several other suspects accused of helping provide the poisonous ingredient. Gundu said no charges had been officially lodged against the suspects.

A phone number listed for the company was not working Friday, and officials could not immediately be reached for comment.

Health officials said earlier that Barewa Pharmaceuticals appears to have been told it was purchasing propylene glycol, a normal ingredient in the teething formula. They said the pharmaceutical company had always bought that ingredient through approved channels before, but had turned to a new source for the ingredient used in the tainted batch.

The food and drug agency said the first sickened child was taken for treatment on Nov. 19 in Nigeria's far northern region. Similar cases turned up in subsequent days in Nigeria's densely populated southwest, and investigators isolated the product as the culprit.

Nigeria has been plagued by tainted, fake or untested drugs since it gained independence from Britain in 1960. About 200 babies died in 1990 under similar circumstances, also from diethylene glycol.

The food and drug administration, however, has drawn plaudits from Nigerians in recent years for having cut down on counterfeit or dangerous medicines.

Diethylene glycol has also been implicated in poisoning cases around the world, including in Panama, where at least 116 people died in 2006 after taking contaminated cough syrup, antihistamine tablets, calamine lotion and rash ointment made at a government laboratory.

The Nigerian teething formula is the only the latest poisoning case to kill the very young.

In China, hundreds of thousands of children fell sick last year and six died after drinking milk tainted with melamine. A court handed down two death penalties and long prison terms for 19 other defendants in the scandal.

__

Associated Press writer Bashir Adigun in Abuja, Nigeria contributed to this report.

___


Link (http://www.ajc.com/news/content/shared-gen/ap/Africa/AF_Nigeria_Fatal_Formula.html)

When people started dropping dead from the Chinese toothpaste, and animals were killed by the "melamine-enhanced" dog food, the Chinese didn't fuck around, they executed the bastards responsible. I can only hope the same thing happens in this case. And to whoever fucked up the peanut butter in the US, for that matter. :gun:

[thome]

Bad News Bad..

Just rememmber the ............Fukker Factor...

[knuckleboner]

first we get rock of love and now this.

fucking brett michaels.

[GAR]

I have sent JHale as emissary of American chastity to teach these Nigerians examples of how not to breed.

[Va Beach VH Fan]

You dug up a thread that's a year and a half old just to make dumbass joke about kids that are dying ??

Grow the fuck up....

[FORD]

He seems to be on a necrospamming binge today. Guess he spent the whole welfare check on MadDog 20/20 again.

[Nitro Express]

A Chinese company was putting diethylene glycol into toothpaste that ended up on the shelves of US dollar stores. The chemical is sweet in taste and is cheaper than glycerin which is used as a sweetener in things like mouthwash, toothpaste, and medicines. This is what makes antifreeze taste good and is the reason dogs and cats get into it and drink it. In fact, if you mixed it with Kool Aid or Gatoraide nobody would know it was in there which makes is a popular chemical used to knock people off and is one of the first chemicals they look for in autopsies. The chemical company probably made a legitimate mistake or sold a batch of diethylene glycol instead of the more expensive glycerine and pocketed the difference.

[Diamondjimi]

I have sent JHale as emissary of American chastity to teach these Nigerians examples of how not to breed.


You dug up a thread that's a year and a half old just to make dumbass joke about kids that are dying ??

Grow the fuck up....

If being an ignorant sack of excrement were grounds for banning, he has met the criteria x10...

What a piece of :shiznit:

[GAR]

This is what makes antifreeze taste good and is the reason dogs and cats get into it and drink it.

Tastes good over ice cream, so no wonder I'm getting these violent headaches. And here, I thought it was lactose intolerance!

[FORD]

Tastes good over ice cream, so no wonder I'm getting these violent headaches. And here, I thought it was lactose intolerance!

...or huffing spray paint in your case.

[Nitro Express]

...or huffing spray paint in your case.

Except Gar can't afford the spray paint so he sniffs exhaust pipes of cars instead.

[jhale667]

Except Gar can't afford the spray paint so he sniffs exhaust pipes of cars instead.

Gas-Huffer?

[chefcraig]

Gas-Huffer?

That would explain all of those dark circles on his forehead, caused by the cars stopping short unexpectedly. Or the flat nose from chasing the parked ones.