Fake ‘Dow Chemical Thailand’ labels found on chemical drums
PUBLISHED : 11 Jan 2024 at 17:53
ISLAMABAD – Pakistan has seized a batch of contaminated propylene glycol solvent that was labelled as manufactured by Dow Chemical, Thailand, the country’s drug regulatory authority said on Thursday.
Fake “Dow Chemical Thailand” labels were also found earlier to have been used on drums of chemicals that eventually were distributed to pharmaceutical companies to make cough syrups, with tragic consequences.
Dow Thailand did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.
The move comes as authorities have identified toxic propylene glycol used in cough syrups as a possible reason for the deaths of more than 300 children in Indonesia, Gambia and Uzbekistan since 2022. The World Health Organization has linked the deaths outside Indonesia to cough syrups made in India.
“The regulatory field force has taken possession of a contaminated batch of Propylene Glycol and is investigating the entire supply chain of this batch,” Pakistan’s drug authority said in an alert, ordering the recall from local and export markets of any products manufactured from the same batch of propylene glycol.
“The batch was labelled as manufactured by Dow Chemical, Thailand,” it said.
“On analysis of a sample by the Central Drug Laboratory in Karachi, an unacceptable level of ethylene glycol was found,” which can lead to serious health risks, the drug authority said.
Testimony in an Indonesian court case has shown that the chain of events that led to the distribution of tainted syrup started in 2021.
That year, a small Indonesian soap ingredient supplier struggling during the Covid pandemic had placed fake “Dow Thailand” labels onto drums containing ethylene glycol that it sold to a distributor. The sales continued until May 2022.
The labels stated that the drums held pharmaceutical-grade propylene glycol, police said. The Indonesian pharmaceutical firm Afi Farma used the falsely labelled chemicals to make its cough syrups.
The toxins were contained in syrups made by at least three Indonesian drugmakers in all, according to national regulators and the World Health Organization.
Ethylene glycol is commonly used in products such as brake fluid and antifreeze. The EG concentration in the syrup base was as high as 99%, Indonesian court documents showed. International standards say only a trace amount of EG, 0.1%, is safe in the legal base ingredient, propylene glycol.
