A pair of shocking scandals involving tainted medicines made in China by Chinese firms is threatening two of the most vulnerable populations in the country: babies and the elderly.
Shenzhen-based Changchun Changsheng Bio-technology, once the favorite of Chinese fund managers because of high growth and huge, profits, was caught supplying ineffective DPT (diphtheria, whooping cough, and tetanus) vaccines to be used to vaccinate babies as young as three months old. The firm also falsified data for its rabies vaccines.
The second erring Chinese pharmaceutical firm, Zhejiang Huahai Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd., was forced to recall huge production batches of its prescription high-blood pressure drug, Valsartan, in 22 countries because the drug includes a cancer-causing impurity.
The twin scandals, which are both embarrassing to Beijing and potentially lethal for its victims, quickly drew official condemnation from the highest levels of the Chinese central government.
Premier Li Keqiang on Monday called for an immediate investigation into Changsheng's substandard vaccines. He blasted the company, saying it had crossed a "moral bottom line" by making and marketing a drug it knew was ineffective.
The official state-run news agency, Xinhua, chimed in and in a scathing editorial said to "Let the vaccine safety lawbreakers lose all their fortunes" because of their crimes.
The stock market immediately punished Changsheng after the news. The company's shares fell the maximum limit of 10 percent on July 20 to 14.5 yuan ($2.14). Changsheng's stock has lost 40 percent of its value since July 13.
Zhejiang's potentially cancer-causing drug Valsartan was exposed by the European Medicines Agency, which found it was tainted with an impurity linked to cancer.
The Valsartan recall involves Canada, Austria, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, and Sweden. Bahrain and Malta are also under the recall.
The Valsartan lots being recall contain trace amounts of "N-nitrosodimethylamine (NDMA)," a probable human carcinogen. Prinson Pharmaceutical Inc., a New Jersey-based Pharma firm that operates as Solco Healthcare elsewhere, issued the recall on July 13. It hasn't reported any adverse reactions to the impurity, according to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
In its defense, Zhejiang Huahai attributed the presence of cancer causing impurity to "a change in the manufacturing process."
Chinese media said worried parents trying to find out if their children had been administered the tainted DPT vaccines. The horror associated with this scandal has led to it becoming the second most watched at the weekend on Weibo, and widely shared on WeChat.
"If the state does not protect its citizens, how can we love our country?" asked one Weibo user.
