New Delhi, July 24 (UNI) The World Health Organisation (WHO) today raised serious concern over the presence of dangerous industrial chemicals in some medicines, especially those meant for children.
In a new report, the WHO warned that toxic substances like diethylene glycol (DEG) and ethylene glycol (EG) are being illegally used in place of safe ingredients, putting lives at risk which it described as a “tragic and ongoing public health crisis”.
In its report “Contaminated medicines and integrity of the pharmaceutical excipients supply chain”, prepared in collaboration with United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) the WHO said that DEG and EG are used as industrial solvents and antifreeze agents “but can cause severe health issues and be fatal if ingested, even in small amounts, especially for children.”
“They are often illegally substituted for pharmaceutical-grade excipients such as propylene glycol, glycerin, and sorbitol — ingredients used in the formulation of medicines, including cough and paracetamol syrups,” the WHO flagged the concern.
The report revealed critical findings on the persistent and preventable threat of contaminated medicines, which claimed the lives and compromised the health of countless patients, predominantly children, through the ingestion of medicines with dangerously high levels of toxic chemicals.
Said the WHO, “Over the past 90 years, at least 25 documented incidents of excipient contamination have resulted in more than 1,300 deaths worldwide, many of them children.”
These incidents occur often due to systemic vulnerabilities in the global supply chain of pharmaceutical excipients, and they have disproportionately affected people in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), where regulatory oversight and access to quality-assured medicines may be limited.
It pointed to the recent case in The Gambia, in which at least 66 children lost their lives, closely followed by similar incidents in Indonesia and Uzbekistan, with a further 268 reported deaths.
The report also revealed how criminal networks exploit market volatility and regulatory gaps to introduce toxic substitutes into the supply chain. These include the use of falsified labels and substitution of toxic chemicals for legitimate excipients such as propylene glycol; the marketing of falsified excipients via online platforms, including e-commerce and social media, among others.
The WHO also flagged a lack of regulatory oversight for manufacturers and distributors of high-risk excipients and deficiencies in post-market surveillance and enforcement mechanisms in both manufacturing and importing countries among a slew of others.
The report has called for urgent global action to plug the gaps, strengthen oversight of excipient supply chains and protect all populations, especially the most vulnerable such as children, from preventable and deadly poisoning.
